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Sunday
15Jun2008

Box Office - 'Hulk' Does $54 Million Worth of Damage

DateSunday, June 15, 2008 at 11:13AM
The 2003 Hulk may have made more money in its opening weekend, but the future is much rosier for this year's installment. The Incredible Hulk made $54 million in its debut It cooled off on Saturday from a $21 million opening day, but Sunday's numbers reflect a typical decline for a big film, which should mean a steady road ahead for Marvel's reinvention.

It's not hard to compare these numbers to Iron Man and say that The Incredible Hulk should make about half as much as the first summer movie, which might be just enough to turn a profit domestically. The international receipts will only pad its stats. It's clear we're not looking at a runaway hit, but a solid summer movie. That might be a little less than Marvel was hoping for, but positive word of mouth for the film could leak out and help it in the next two critical weekends.

Night Shyamalan's The Happening also had a big Friday, but whereas The Incredible Hulk still made $50-odd million, The Happening quickly faded, with only $7 million on Sunday. Its three-day total was $30 million, according to Box Office Mojo, and applying the same logic to this film as Hulk, it may make money at the end of the day; it's about halfway there already. Unfortunately, word of mouth will be less kind to The Happening. This movie should see a rather quick departure from the top ten.

Kung Fu Panda was the weekend's number two film, generating another $34 million in ticket sales. There's a slim chance this could hit $150 million in the next seven days - very slim - but I do think we're looking at a total box office in the $175 - $185 million range, which is certainly healthy if not overwhelming.

Next week will be interesting: Two comedies, Get Smart and The Love Guru, will open against one another. That's a bizarre strategy, and you'd think a comedy would work better against Hulk just as The Happening would work better in the marketplace if it were up against a comedy. Get Smart is opening in about 1,000 more theaters, which should be enough to get it the top spot, but if there's a lot of redundancy between its audience and that for The Love Guru, The Incredible Hulk could sneak back in at number one if it can make another $25 - $30 million.

The top five:

1 - The Incredible Hulk ($54 million)

2 - Kung Fu Panda ($34 million)

3 - The Happening ($30 million)

4 - You Don't Mess With the Zohan ($16 million)

5 - Indiana Jones ($13 million)

AuthorColin Boyd | | in , , , , , | Print ArticlePrint Article | | CommentPost a Comment |

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