scott shelton

We can't.

But what has been forgotten by seemingly every media outlet and Peter Jackson fanboy is that TITANIC opened against a James Bond film, where KONG has the weekend all to itself.

I'm all for waiting for Sunday to call the KONG grosses, but let's also wait before we start comparing this film to the cultural phenomenon of TITANIC.

I'm no fan of KONG, but to see the grosses pounced on like this is a tad sickening.

B5Erik

I can't see it until Sunday due to child care issues (and work, of course). I have a feeling that's true for a lot of people.

One day and "the sky is falling" crowd comes out. Give it a couple of weeks - it's gotten very good reviews overall and audience reactions seem to be very good. That's good for the long haul at the box office.

animalmystic

Going to see this on Saturday, but that sounds like a weak ass opening to me.

PopcornTreeCt

Don't blame it on the weather or College Finals, or lackluster marketing. People just aren't interesting in seeing it.

Terrell

Not with a 10 million dollar Wednesday. Wednesday openings almost always are followed by a drop on Thursday. Assuming Kong could equal that take on Thursday, it would have to make 100 million on the weekend. I don't see it coming close to that. I'm guessing somewhere in the 70-75 million dollar range, bringing it in to around 90-95 million for the 5 days. We'll see.


But I do agree with others that people were expecting it to challenge Titanic was just ridiculously stupid. Nothing is going to challenge Titanic. Perhaps if TPM didn't disappoint many, and managed to live up to it's unlivable hype, it might have pushed 525+ million. But that's about it. When ticket prices rise in the future, something will beat it. But by that time it won't mean much because of those sky high ticket prices.

I'm checking out Narnia tomorrow night and Kong on Saturday.

Jackskeleton

it's still rather early to jump to that conclusion.

kvrdave

I will wait for the DVD, personally. I mean, William Shatner isn't in it, right?

Cameron

well i saw it opening nite...loved it. worth the time and money.

Matthew Chmiel

Hey. Let's not forget that Mouse Hunt opened up that same weekend as well.

sabre

this movie is in serious danger of being a disaster. i thought it was just me that had no enthusiasm for this film but it seems i am not alone. people, like joel siegel here in nyc, thinking it would challenge titanic are just plain ignorant of the business aspects of moviemaking. titantic made only 28 million in its first weekend up against james bond movie tommorrow never dies and then had like 10 weekends of over 40 million dollars in us grosses. that is extremely difficult to do.

Mr. Cinema

Your first mistake is actually reading anything Joel Siegel writes. This is the same guy that said these quotes:

The Alamo - Spectacular! Thornton is Oscar-quality brilliant!
The Stepford Wives - It's a flat-out comedy - Funny!
The Ladykillers – Get ready to duck – the laughs come from everywhere!
The Brothers Grimm - Sheer magic! Absolutely enchanting. Matt Damon and Heath Ledger are terrific.
Scary Movie 3 – Funnier than the first two! I fell down laughing…This is funny, funny, funny! The third time’s the charm!
Timeline - Pure popcorn fun at the movies!

Second mistake is judging the film's box office "failures" on its first day opening....which happened to be a Wednesday in the middle of December.


For the 3, 249, 188 time....saying any movie has a shot at beating Titanic's box office record is completely insane.

RichC2

Well, that's likely, but that said, I had to hold off due to Finals.

Damn things.

RayChuang

You are right in your assessments. I think revenues for King Kong will pick up substantially this coming weekend as college finals ends and office workers have completed all work necessary for the calendar year.

ChrisKnudsen

FUCK KONG (even though it was good)! BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN WILL GROSS A MILLION DOLLARS (MAYBE) JUST PLAYING ON 8 SCREENS WITH 3 SCREENS BEING ADDED ON WEDNESDAY IN ONE WEEK (got boasted from 5 on Wednesday probably to meet the demand in New York, LA, and San Francisco being flooded with people wanted to watch the "best" movie of the year ("best" is in quotations because I still haven't seen it, yet). When Brokeback expands to 300 screens and if had the same weekend per screen as it did last week, it would gross 33 million dollars! On 300 screens! Seriously, though, I think it is going to make a lot, like in the 6 to 10 million range (that is pretty much a 20,000 to 33,000 per screen average) when it opens to 300 screens. This weekend will still be high, like a 3 to 6 million dollar gross maybe on 69 screens.

ChrisKnudsen

And if anything is going to break Titanic this year (with all this ridiculous talk of it), it is going to be Brokeback Mountain.

GuessWho

I plan on waiting a few weeks to see Kong. No rush--it's the same movie a month from now as it is today. Looks like I'm not the only one thinking this way.

mrpayroll

http://www.zap2it.com/movies/news/st...-27454,00.html

Monkey Business: 'Kong' Has Lackluster Wednesday
Thursday , December 15, 2005
01:12 PM PT

LOS ANGELES (Zap2it.com)- Uh-oh. It may take a few more days before industry observers will be ready to crown this "Kong" as a box office king.

The highly anticipated Peter Jackson remake "King Kong" opened on Wednesday (Dec. 14) to a solid, but hardly exceptional $9.755 million take. The effects-laden "Kong" easily topped "The Chronicles of Narnia" ($3.507 million) for the day, according to Exhibitor Relations. However, the "Kong" numbers rank as only the 21st highest Wednesday premiere of all-time.

"Spider-Man 2" holds the Wednesday premiere record, with a whopping $40.4 million on June, 30, 2004. This will actually go down as only the fourth best Wednesday opening of Jackson's career, after "The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King" ($34.45 million), "The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers" ($26.2 million) and "The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring" ($18.2 million).

On an entirely empirical level, it'd be difficult to imagine Universal Pictures not being somewhat disappointed by those numbers, particularly with "Kong" playing in 3567 theaters. It will instead be emphasized that with a three-hour running time, "Kong" had an uphill climb on a weekday with no holiday associations. In addition, Universal has been actively pushing "Kong" as a love story, aiming for a female audience that might be less likely to rush to a mid-week screening. Then again, if your first day can't even keep pace with "Pokemon," you've got to do a lot of rationalizing.

One way or the other, even in an industry as instant-gratification-oriented as Hollywood, it's still far too early to make any kind of judgments about the future of "Kong." Far too early for anybody but Matt Drudge, who already has a "'Kong' Bomb?" headline up on his site.

Despite a far-from-stellar first day, it remains unlikely that "King Kong" is really going to disappoint most box office observers in the long run. Thus, in the interest of getting all possible "'Kong' Is a Bomb" headlines out of the way up front, here are a few suggestions:


"Kong" Slips on Box Office Banana Peel.
It wasn't the Airplanes, it was the Box Office that Killed the Beast.
"King Kong" Opening is Beastly.
This Gorilla Isn't Real Magilla.
"King Kong" falls flat.
"King Kong" Strikes Out with Girl and Box Office.
No Princely Sum for This "King"
"Kong" Goes Wrong.
Not-So-Great Ape
Audiences Toss Feces at Monkey Flick
Donkey 'Kong'
'King' Dethrones


Chris

Hokeyboy

Showbizdata is reporting a 6 million dollar Thursday.

Oopah!

scott shelton

Thursday...

1) KING KONG 6.2
16.0

2) CHRONICLES OF NARNIA 3.6
81.3

3) SYRIANA .7
16.8

4) HARRY POTTER AND THE GOBLET OF FIRE .6
246.6

5) WALK THE LINE .4
78.9

6) PRIDE AND PREJUDICE .3
27.6

7) AEON FLUX .3
21.4

8) JUST FRIENDS .3
27.4

9) YOURS, MINE & OURS .2
41.7

10) POLAR EXPRESS, THE .1
167.1

ChrisKnudsen

King Kong got my 5.50 yesterday. And Walk the Line got my 5.50 today. Chronicles will get my 5.50 tommorrow.

Maryang Palad

It looks like my kids are aiming towards Chronicles of Narnia this Saturday.

fryinpan1

Kong looks like the best movie of the year, but I will not be adding to the box office revenue. I prefer to wait for the DVD.

slop101

You guys think Kong will improve considerably over the weekend - My friends and I, for example, are waiting for Saturday matinee.

Mr. Cinema

It's a much better idea to judge a film's box office fate after its second weekend. But we're ready to bash this one and it's not even had a chance at the first opening weekend.

jaeufraser

Disaster? No. Disapointment? Well, kind of early to call but I'll admit it's a possibility.

As for Titanic, let's qualify that movie. First off, it never made over 40 million dollars in a single weekend. It made over 30 million on two seperate weekends but past that it was all in the 20 or teens while it was number one. We must also keep in mind that 28 million in December 1997 is a great opening. After Scream 2 which opened just the week before, it was the second highest opening in December ever. You are right, what Titanic did by staying at number one and making double digits is something that is alsmot impossible for a film to do. Kong I have no doubt will not be doing that.

But in 1997, 28 million dollars for Titanic, and 25 million dollars for Bond, were fantastic numbers. Multipliers back then were, for the most part, higher than they are today. Hell Mousehunt opened to 6 million and made well over 60...that doesn't happen much either. This holiday frame though, is something that gives a lot of films nice legs. Kong will benefit heavily from that (as will other films).