Fearless Forecast - Big Things for 'Wild Things'

Spike Jonze's Where the Wild Things Are tops the list of new releases this weekend, and much like Couples Retreat was a man among boys last weekend, that should be reflected here, as well, though not to the degree it was a week ago. Warner Bros. would like Where the Wild Things Are to be a massive hit, as it would with all of its movies, but this one in particular might be on the studio's wish list. We don't know exactly how much of the film was reshot about a year ago or how much that cost, but we know it was a pretty big overhaul, and those are expensive. So, realistically, this has to make probably at least 50% more than it would have needed to if Warner Bros. didn't commission a bunch of re-shoots. Perhaps audiences will show up in droves weeks from now; that's the ideal scenario. The two new films vying for the leftover dollars are Law Abiding Citizen and The Stepfather; neither has much of a chance, and collectively they'd probably finish a distant second to Where the Wild Things Are. However, the real second place film should be Paranormal Activity. It might drop to third behind Couples Retreat, but that's the race to watch this weekend. Paranormal, of course, is the super-low-budget thrilla that Paramount has so brilliantly marketed that last weekend it became the biggest earner ever for a movie in fewer than 200 theaters, ultimately finishing in fourth place (early estimates had it in fifth). It expands again this weekend into about 600 - 800 houses (or so I've read), and should explode into around 2,000 a week from now, meaning this could be the first of back-to-back $20 million weekends for a movie that cost under $20,000. Honestly, I don't think it will do quite that well, because Law Abiding and Stepfather each make a play for some of the same dollars, if you were to lay it out as a Venn diagram or something. But north of $15 million? Probably so. That would take the total to around $30 million, with another $30 million or more coming in the seven days after that thanks to the wider release. By November, Paranormal Activity should be in the $70 - $75 million ballpark. It truly is an astonishing run; if you look at Tuesday's daily numbers, Paranormal was in third place, averaging almost $6,000 more per screen than any other movie in the top 20. By comparison, Couples Retreat averaged $895 per screen that day but earned the most money overall. Perhaps a more telling number is that the Tuesday per-screen beat everything in the weekend top 20 - when viewing is much, much higher - with the exception of Couples Retreat and, of course, itself. The Top Five:
1 - Where the Wild Things Are ($33 million)
2 - Paranormal Activity ($18.5 million)
3 - Couples Retreat ($18 million)
4 - Stepfather ($10.5 million)
5 - Law Abiding Citizen ($9 million)

Comments

[Vince]

What if "Paranormal Activity" takes the win? There's so much hype here. The release pattern reminds me not only of "Blair Witch" but also of how Fox handled "Borat" in 2006- they didn't open immediately wide, but they let word of mouth and hype build up to a point where the demand necessitated the relase. I would not be surprised if the film opens in the high 20s-low 30s. That is, if it opens in 800 theaters or more.

Although I absolutely cannot wait to go see "Wild Things", I'm still not sure if other people are sold. It doesn't seem like a kids movie to me- it seems very much like an indie flick with bizarre dream sequences as opposed to a family film. If I were a kid, I would be more frightful of the Wild Things, just because they look so scary and unhappy in the trailers Roger Ebert even commented in his review that the film won't play as well with kids "who have been trained on slam-bam action animation."

I've been totally wrong before, many times (remember how I said that "Fame" was going to open in mid 20s?) But...I would not be surprised if the first place battle was closer than people think.

[Get The Big Picture]

It would require a huge letdown from Wild Things, almost 40% off the estimates, if Paranormal stays around $20 million. That's not likely. It could be that Paranormal does slightly better and Wild Things does slightly worse, so the numbers are closer, but for Wild Things to fall off the map, I think, would be a big, big shock.

Borat actually opened in 800 theaters or so in its debut weekend, so the release pattern is a little different. By the time Paranormal gets to that many theaters, it will have been out for four weeks. Not to say the bloom is off the rose, but it will already be over $12 million before it gets to Friday, so a lot of the must-see crowd has seen it.

It's an interesting thing to think about, more because of what Where the Wild Things Are would fail to do in that scenario.