fitprod

To say the final number for the weekend are in flux, would be an understatement...

What we do know, Monsters University will finish first with anywhere between $49 to $51 million. The Heat will finish in 2nd, but exactly how much, seen final estimates as low as $35 million and as high as $41 million, it looks like Saturday will be the key.

It's probably going to be a slap fight between White House Down, and World War Z for third. White House Down is under-performing, and will finish with $30 million, if it's lucky.

World War Z fell off about 65% from it's previous Friday, but is expected by Deadline to finish ahead of White House Down when all is said and done. (But their estimates jumped all over the place yesterday... So we really wont know until Sunday.) At least Sony's This is the End is holding up well, helping absorbing some of the White House Down damage. White House Down's only hope of a chance of breaking even is going to come down to it's international numbers.

Man of Steel, held better this weekend, but will still be lucky to get to $300 million domestically, since there's just too much competition coming up over the 4th of July weekend. While Despicable Me 2 is not direct competition, The Lone Ranger, even if it open relatively poorly, will pull more of the core audience away from Man of Steel, as well as the residual effects of World War Z.

As for the rest of the top 10... As noted This is the End continues to perform well, especially considering it's budget. Now You See Me also continues to fill Lionsgate/Summits bank accounts by crossing $100 million. It feels like it is over-performing, but it did cost $75 million before marketing, but who know...

Star Trek Into Darkness continues to limp to the finish line, likely to finish around $225 million, which is below what Paramount expected for a sequel to a well re-received re-boot. Ultimately, when adjusted for inflation, it will end up 4th in the franchise, behind Star Trek IV. - If there's any solace for Paramount, it will become the most successful Star Trek film internationally.

fitprod

Brack

This is what I figured it would go down for the new releases. There was no real buzz for White House Down, and people have been looking for another comedy with appealing leads (even if I have no interest in seeing the fim), which The Heat appears to be for the time being. Perhaps WHD will have some good word of mouth, but people don't seem to understand that Channing Tatum is very popular with female audiences, but they don't want to go see him in straight-up action movies, evidently.

Mike86

Kind of surprised The Heat did as well as it did. It looks like an okay rental or something to catch on one of the premium channels eventually but not something I'd see in theaters. I can't say I'm surprised about White House Down though as we received a very similar film just a few months back. Looks like an okay popcorn flick but still. Monster's U is no surprise that it's holding strong. Disney/Pixar outings seem to usually rake in the cash.

Iron_Giant

Loved Monster's U, laughed a ton...ending tied into Monster's Inc very well.

GoldenJCJ

I don't know wha to make of White House Down, the reviews seem to be mixed. RogerEbert.com gave it 3 out of 4 stars but Richard Roeper gave it an 'F'. So I don't know. That plus the fact the we just had Olympis has Fallen makes me wonder if people are in the mood for another "Die Hard in the White House" movie so soon.

Too bad about Star Trek, it is one of my favorite movie of the Summer so far.

RichC2

1. Monsters U hold is about what I expected, Pixar is one of the few animation studios that has a slew of adult fans who ran out and saw the movie last Friday, I personally think it will pull closer to $50m than $47m.

2. The Heat was expected to do well, but I'm sure they're surprised it did this well.

3. WWZ held up well.

4. White House Down will do well over the 4th, we're a patriotic country that loves seeing shit blow up. If Man of Steel opened one week later I would say that'd be the one to reap the benefit.

5. Man of Steel - After re-evaluating numbers a bit, it should end up with about $304m domestic.

6. This is the End is doing great

7. Now You See Me - the budget seems higher than you'd usually get from a movie like this but it appears they pre-sold most of the international rights and were likely closer to $40m out of pocket upon release.

8. Star Trek Into Darkness will end up with about $450 - $500m worldwide, that ain't bad.

Solid Snake

I liked STID but it should be doing better considering the budget it had.

Michael Corvin

Wow, didn't know Ebert was still cranking out reviews.

Dragon Tattoo

...what the fuck? How?!

My Other Self

RogerEbert.com has contributing film reviewers. Obviously, Ebert isn't reviewing anything from the afterlife.

Charlie Goose

I'm not really surprised by the success of The Heat. Melissa McCarthy's last movie Identity Thief opened around $35M and recouped it's budget in three days. Now she's paired with a proven star in Sandra Bullock.

islandclaws

If budget were an indicator of how well a film should be doing, then we'd be getting Battleship 2 next summer.

Brack

You'd think Hollywood would get this, but they don't. There was no reason that movie had to be made for $209m.

The answer is to try to lower these budgets to a reasonable level. The studios need to stop making movies with such a large budget that it needs to gross at least $500m worldwide just to break even. I think George Lucas' most expensive movie, Star Wars Ep 3, cost $115m to make. I know there's some inflation involved, but it hasn't been that much different from 2005 to now.

DJariya

I liked White House Down, but I'm not surprised that it got snuffed by the competition.

I think it would have had a better chance had it not opened in the same year and only 3 months apart from Olympus has Fallen. Luckily for Olympus has Fallen it had 1/2 the budget of White House Down and was considered a box office hit. It looks like WHD will be lucky to even hit $100M domestic....I mean very lucky. I could end up being a box office bomb for Emmerich and Sony.

Mr. Cinema

Boxoffice.com:

1 Monsters University $46,180,000 -44% 4,004 0 $11,533 $171,005,448 2 Disney
2 The Heat $40,000,000 -- 3,181 -- $12,575 $40,000,000 1 Fox
3 World War Z $29,800,000 -55% 3,607 0 $8,262 $123,722,294 2 Paramount
4 White House Down $25,700,000 -- 3,222 -- $7,976 $25,700,000 1 Sony / Columbia
5 Man of Steel $20,820,000 -50% 4,131 -76 $5,040 $248,660,106 3 Warner Bros.
6 This Is The End $8,700,000 -35% 2,710 -345 $3,210 $74,681,009 3 Sony / Columbia
7 Now You See Me $5,500,000 -30% 2,564 -259 $2,145 $104,680,591 5 Lionsgate / Summit
8 Fast & Furious 6 $2,400,000 -51% 1,550 -867 $1,548 $233,302,770 6 Universal
9 Star Trek Into Darkness $2,040,000 -36% 1,035 -530 $1,971 $220,500,867 7 Paramount
10 The Internship $1,425,000 -58% 1,008 -908 $1,414 $41,705,086 4 Fox
11 The Purge $1,229,000 -66% 1,122 -1079 $1,095 $62,791,720 4 Universal

Man of Steel's actual estimated hold was 49.6%. That's a bit better than Pirates 3 at the same time frame. Not too bad considering all of the competition. It also received a 39.5% bump on Saturday. It'll get a nice July 4 bump as well next week. I think $300 mil is still very possible. It added $83 million in foreign gross and now has a new estimated worldwide total of $520 million. It still has more markets to debut in, including Japan.

Shannon Nutt

OLYMPUS HAS FALLEN had a bigger opening weekend than WHITE HOUSE DOWN. Didn't see that one coming. I wonder how many movie goers didn't pick it because their spouse said "We already saw that movie!"

resinrats

I have to wonder how 2 of the same type movies got made to be released in the same year. Did one studio hear of the other being made and decide to copy it or did they somehow both happened to get greenlit without knowing. Probably would have been smarted to save WHD until November or next year.

I know the same kind of thing happened with asteroid, volcano, CGI bugs but those seemed to do OK.

How long before the same thing happens again but they both open on the same weekend.

DJariya

According to IMDB, Olympus has Fallen began principal photography around July of last year. White House Down started around August.

Olympus has Fallen was produced by an Indie studio and has made over $160M worldwide with a budget of $70M.

I agree that Sony probably made a mistake releasing it so soon. But, I think they were/are trying to capitalize on Channing Tatum's popularity since he's the hottest young movie star right now.

Matthew Chmiel

Here's the thing, with films like Armageddon and Deep Impact or Antz and A Bug's Life or Mirror Mirror and Snow White and The Huntsman, they only came out within two months of each other. Yet in some of those cases, the later released films were always the higher grossing.

Having two similar films released within each other isn't why White House Down underperformed. It's because the film really isn't that good and there's already other PG-13 action fare in the marketplace (Man of Steel, World War Z, Fast & Furious 6, etc) and there's still more coming out within the next week. Olympus Has Fallen didn't have any similar competition and positive WOM helped it climb in the box office. White House Down doesn't have that.

wm lopez

I think what turned off movie goers was Jamie Foxx as President.
It's well known Foxx is a supporter of Obama.

Supermallet

Mod Note: wmlopez, you've been back a week and you cannot stop yourself from making political comments in non-political threads. You've been warned repeatedly about this in the past, and if you do it again, it will lead to more serious disciplinary action. Cut it out.

stingermck

PenguinJoe

I think Jamie Foxx would've been better in the Channing Tatum role, Channing Tatum isn't really a big enough star.

Brack

I'm still not convinced wm lopez is for real. It's got to be a put on.

Wazootyman

I'd say Channing is actually the bigger star than Foxx. Just look at 2012, when he had Magic Mike, 21 Jump Street and The Vow, compared to Foxx's Django Unchained.

Heck, outside of Django, when has Foxx last had a big movie?