Friday
20Nov2009
Box Office: 'New Moon' Breaks $20 Million at Midnight
Friday, November 20, 2009 at 11:48AM
We knew New Moon would be headed for a great big weekend, but this big? Even that's a little surprsing. Deadline Hollywood cites sources from other studios saying that the Twilight sequel has debuted in the mid-$20 million range for midnight showings, slightly better than Harry Potter, and substantially more than The Dark Knight last summer.
Colin Boyd | Permalink | in Box Office, New Moon, Twilight | Print Article | Email Article | 5 Comments | Share Article
Reader Comments (5)
Does this series have the legs to go the distance, or will the final installments be presented as movies of the week on basic cable? If they continue to be bad I can only imagine that there will be backlash at some point, won't there?
Will, the franchise will finish up, I can guarantee it. The budgets for these movies are pretty small ($37 million for the first movie, $50-60 mil for "New Moon") and the profits are huge. "New Moon" will likely make $200 million in the US at least, which is fantastic for a movie that cost maybe a third of what real "blockbusters" cost to make. That's before factoring in worldwide receipts, DVD sales, TV rights, merchandising deals, etc.
Even if there's a backlash, it won't hit until "Eclipse" comes out in June. IF that disappoints & makes roughly half in total ticket sales (for the sake of this let's say $200 million worldwide) on that $60 million budget, it's still a hit. That'll be enough for Summit Entertainment to put "Breaking Dawn" into production and not be worried that they'll lose money (because they won't). It's kinda like the "Saw" series on a larger scale;the studio is still making money even if the budget to profit margins are getting smaller.
I agree with nearly everything you said, Vince. I didn't know the budget was that high, probably because I never checked since it was going to be an enormous hit, anyway. The only thing I'll disagree with is that Summit would be disappointed if this film or the next only did $200 million worldwide because that studio doesn't have anything else going for it to make up the difference, the way Fox and Sony and Warners can always back off a bad Eddie Murphy movie because another tentpole is right around the corner.
I don't know what the number would be to make a big profit - probably around $200 million, you're right about that - but given the studio's lack of other major properties at this stage, I think they'd want to see the number significantly higher and might even plan for it.
there will be no backlash. i went to the opening night show and the majority of the crowd applauded the film when it finished. the ladies really fell for all the eye candy. i've never been to this sort of big female event, and it was quite the experience. it was so different watching this sort of movie with this demographic compared to the fanboy demographic of comic-book, sci-fi, and fantasy movies. any fanboy should go just once to enjoy the funny expereince. seriously, these fangirls are even crazier than the fanboys. no exaggeration.
sorry if my last comments seemed sexist but it's the truth. went to lots of opening nights for comic movies (i.e. dark knight) and there were no stampedes to get into the auditorium first like last night.