Box Office Mojo says 55mill for Friday! We may have the first movie ever to reach 100mill in 2 days...

It's an Entourage reference.

Looks like it'll dust that 3-day total.

Holy carp!

thats crazy 55.6 million in one day, so how much this weekend 150 million?

Yeah, and then some. I'm amazed.

I don't think it will reach that. With such a gigantic opening yesterday, I expect a drop today.

I think the forecast is now about $138 million, which is simply incredible.

I think they are crunching the numbers wrong. Ok, maybe not. It's just so hard to believe that it made 55 million in one day.

55 million on friday; it's the biggest single day and opening day ever, a new record according to boxofficemojo.

As I said, I'm not surprised it beat Sith's opening day mark.

i think the secret to its success is it's bankable star, johnny depp, which draws in the girls. movies like star wars have a great draw because of the fans, but it's harder to get girls to see it because in their mind it's just a bunch of nerdy star wars fanatics. a movie like this has a lot broader appeal and two heartthrobs in depp and bloom; so you get the action fans who are the boys, and the depp and bloom fans, which are the girls.

So you think Harrison Ford, Ewan or Hayden didn't have that female appeal? I sort of doubt that. Just remember that every generation has a sort of heartdrob that females follow. The first one was a surprise hit and this one simply followed suit with drawing the crowds. Sure having Depp in it (oh, he's so dreamy) and Bloom in it helped it some, but it still has that star wars appeal written all over it.

I think the Depp factor is huge. Kind of like that guy in that movie about the sinking ship.

The Depp factor is not huge, he's never been a big draw to the movies, Depp playing Jack Sparrow though, that's huge.

Yeah, it's the franchise, not the actors. Otherwise "Finding Neverland" would have grossed a mint, but it didn't, same with "Kingdom of Heaven" or "Pride and Prejudice".

That's not true according to every girl i've talked to in my city.

Who could blame em, he is a sexy fella... what a hearthrob. If I was ten years older and liked cock I'd be all over him.

He's a great actor, good looking guy, but doesn't attract crowds usually.

You could attribute a few movies to him (Pirates, of course, and possibly Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - though thats more brand recognition and Tim Burton's style, they could have cast a blind/deaf/mute guy as Wonka and it woulda done well). But overall, he's a great character actor with a not-so-rabid following.

From BOM :
Opening Weekend: $132,028,000
(4,133 theaters, $31,944 average)
% of Total Gross: 100.0%

Widest Release: 4,133 theaters

In Release: 3 days / 0.4 weeks


(estimate still but not too shabby)

http://www.boxofficemojo.com/news/?id=2111&p=.htm

'Pirates' Raid Record Books
by Brandon Gray
July 9, 2006


Yo ho, yo ho. A pirate's life for… everyone.

Or so it seems after Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest plundered the record books with an estimated $132 million opening weekend, swatting Spider-Man's long standing $114.8 million milestone atop the all time chart.

Buena Vista's swarthy sequel marauded over 8,500 screens at 4,133 sites—the third widest debut ever—compared to Spider-Man's 7,500 screens at 3,615 sites, though Pirates' estimated 20 million admissions out-paced Spidey by only a hair.


Pirates pilfered a trove of records, but the key ones, in addition to opening weekend, were biggest single and opening day and fastest to $100 million. On Friday, Dead Man's Chest raked in $55.5 million (including $9 million's worth of 2,100 midnight showings), eclipsing Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith's $50 million and grossing more in one day than its predecessor, The Curse of the Black Pearl, did in its entire opening weekend. Dead Man's Chest also became the first picture to cross the century mark in two days flat.

That rare crowd pleaser, The Curse of the Black Pearl made Dead Man's Chest the most anticipated picture of 2006. For decades, audiences had been averse to pirate movies—many notorious flops belonged to the genre, including Cutthroat Island and Pirates—but Buena Vista gambled three years ago with a costly movie based on the famous Disneyland attraction. Curse stood out with a mixture of swashbuckling adventure, humor, horror and Johnny Depp's characterization of rapscallion Jack Sparrow, and it ultimately grossed $305.4 million. With Dead Man's Chest, Buena Vista's marketing maintained the spirit of the original.

"The first movie was such a beloved title," said Chuck Viane, Buena Vista's president of distribution. "Jack Sparrow became a household name, and you had this pent-up demand to see the sequel. [Dead Man's Chest] was like the old days where going to the movies was a fun event."


Orlando Bloom in Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest

In order to reach record heights Dead Man's Chest appealed across all demographic groups, including an equal gender split. "There wasn't a category that stood out," Viane noted. "It was just a total blend." The studio's exit polling indicated that the audience's assessment was on par with the original with 92 percent rating Dead Man's Chest "excellent" or "very good," and pollster CinemaScore backed that up with an "A-" rating.

The third Pirates picture, At World's End, which was in production simultaneously with Dead Man's Chest in the tradition of the Back to the Future and Matrix sequels, will set sail on May 25 of next year. Combined, the Pirates sequels reportedly will cost $450 million to produce.

Powered by Pirates, the weekend as a whole marked the first time a top 12 has grossed more than $200 million. Overall business was up nearly 50 percent over the same weekend last year when Fantastic Four debuted on top.

Last weekend's high flyer, Superman Returns, was sacked in its second outing, plunging 58 percent. Cut down by Pirates, mixed word-of-mouth and the front-loadedness of the superhero genre, Warner Bros.' franchise resurrection earned an estimated $21.9 million for $141.7 million in 12 days—the picture's IMAX theaters, though, were down 27 percent and accounted for ten percent of the weekend gross. By comparison, Warner's previous revival, Batman Begins, descended 43 percent to $27.6 million in its second weekend, albeit opposite far less imposing competition.

Any idea how it did with regards to actual ticket sales vs. $. I still can't believe they use actual $ to compare films over time when the only true comparison is ticket sales.

The only comparison I've seen is that it sold an estimated 200,000 more tickets than Spider-man. So find the number of tickets Spider-man sold opening weekend and you're set. It makes sense they compare by $, since $$ is the bottomline.

I'm one of the lucky ones I suppose, ticket prices here have only gone up $0.50 in the last eight years or so. And that was only for Fri/Sat/Sun evening showings, matinees and weekday evenings are all still $5.50.

Oh really?

Then why are book, CD & DVD sales based on units sold, not $?

Let's not forget Nielsen ratings while we're at it.

I just said it made sense is all, wasn't evaluating the entirity of world entertainment. Plus, budgets of movies are just that much more obvious, I can't remember the last time I checked the budget of a book or cd, so it's easier to justify to stockholders or whomever else when you can show $$. I mean, we all know that $$ is chopped up repeatidly before any real profit is shown, and advertising is rarely included in the budget. But numbers impress people.

Dont forget:

The Jacket, Elizabethtown, The Libertine