By Todd Allen
Avengers continues rule the U.S. box office and climb up the global rankings. Avengers is now the #4 grossing film all-time in the global market and #6 in the U.S market.
Weekend estimates for the US are a little over $55 million, a drop of 46.6% from last weekend. Avengers also lost only 100 screens from last week. The nearest competitor was another science fiction FX fest, Battleship, which managed to pull in $25.3M. Next week will be a little bigger test of the Avengers’ staying power as Men In Black III unleashes Will Smith’s box office draw with plenty of FX on the side. It will be interesting to see how many screens MiB III pulls away from Avengers. Avengers still has an enviable per screen average, but those MiB screens have to come from somewhere.
With a domestic total estimated at a bit over $457M, Avengers will probably overtake Star Wars and Phantom Menace to land at #4 all-time for domestic films. Dark Knight is #3 with $533M. Avengers could well overtake that. Avatar is the highest grossing film with$760.5M, followed by Titanic with$658.5M. It still seems a little ambitious for Avengers to retain enough screens to make a run at #1 or #2, but we’ll see.
On the Global side, Avengers has grossed $1.18B. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2 is currently #3 with $1.32B. Titanic is #2 with $2.18B. Avatar rules the roost with $2.78B. Avengers hasn’t opened in Japan yet, so it’s pretty a lock to lap Harry Potter for #3 all-time. Avengers would have to add one billion dollars of box office to pass Titanic. That probably isn’t going to happen.
This summer has some pretty highly anticipated films: MiB III next week, Amazing Spider-Man and Dark Knight Rises in July. The studios are hoping for more performances similar to Avengers this year. Something that pops this big is hard to duplicate, but there are three blockbuster franchises waiting in the wings.
“…followed by Titanic with $658.5M” that’s if you include the money it made from the 3D re-release. I think Avengers has a shot at passing Titanic’s original $600 million domestically.
There’s no doubt it will surpass Dark Knight domestically. How close it gets to Titanic is the question. It has great weekend numbers but the weekday numbers aren’t amazingly stellar like Dark Knight’s numbers were.
I don’t doubt that MIB3 will unseat The Avengers next weekend, but is there excitement for it? I’m not hearing anyone really talking about wanting to see it.
There’s still a handful of movies going into their 5th and 6th weeks of release that are playing in 1,000-2,000 theatres that will probably see their numbers slashed. And with the poor performance of every new movie this week (and Dark Shadows with its 57% drop), they will probably get their screen counts/times cut to accommodate Avengers and MIB3.
“Avengers hasn’t opened in Japan yet, so it’s pretty a lock to lap Harry Potter for #3 all-time.”
Todd Allen, why don’t you proof-read your articles? If YOU don’t want to read them, why would I?
These numbers are less relavent than if they were adjusted for inflation. “Gone With the Wind” only grossed $75 million at the box office which probably wouldn’t put it in the top 200 grossing movies. However that’s $75 mm in 1939 dollars which adjusted for inflation makes it the #1 grossing picture in movie history.
Some of those screens might come from “The Hunger Games”:
Box Office Mojo:
The Hunger Games LGF
#7 this week
#4 last week
$3,000,000 -33.4% drop
2,064 screens -467 from last week (#6)
$1,453 per screen average (#17 overall)
$391,631,000 total gross
$78 Million budget
9 weeks in release
The Lucky One also has a lot of screens (2,005), but not enough sales ($880 per).
@mosihe, yeah, it’s the 61st-top-grossing adjusted for inflation, finally edging out Tootsie but still behind Butch Cassidy, Beverly Hills Cop, Ghostbusters, and 57 others. No knocks against Avengers, of course; these others just found a bigger audience, if that’s the way you happen to measure a movie’s success.
“However that’s $75 mm in 1939 dollars which adjusted for inflation makes it the #1 grossing picture in movie history.”
True, but that was also before DVD’s, blu-rays, iTunes and so much more. In 1939 the only way to see a movie was in the theatre. Will Avengers or any other blockbuster compare to that? Perhaps, but studios are never that transparent to compare money or simple how attendance compares.