Fearless Forecast - 'Angels & Demons' and Romulans

It's a generalization that isn't always true: The sequel does better. It's uusually the case when a movie is kind of a surprise hit, like National Treasure, but when there's a mountain of expectations placed on the first film in the series, like The Da Vinci Code, having the sequel meet or beat those numbers isn't a sure thing. Here's what you should consider with Da Vinci: When it opened in 2006, it was the third blockbuster that summer, or at least, that was the plan. But Poseidon was one of the worst summer movies in recent memory and Mission: Impossible 3 was not as big a hit as the previous two. As a result of that, The Da Vinci Code had a pretty clear path on May 19, 2006. That's not the case now, however. Angels & Demons not only has to overcome middling reviews from the first film - which Tom Hanks joked was universally panned during a recent interview - but there's also Star Trek, which should have the strongest second weekend of any movie until Transformers. Angels is also opening in about 10% fewer theaters, so at the very least, you'd expect an opening weekend 10% less than the first one. Of course, that would only knock this film down to $70 million, but I don't think there's any chance it does that kind of business. That's where Trek and he reaction to The Da Vinci Code comes in. Now, I still expect it to have a good weekend, but probably the lowest among the May box office champs. It should still hit $175 million or so (and then who knows from there), in large part because this isn't a movie particularly aimed at the opening weekend crowd. Moviegoers over the age of 40 don't have to see a film when it opens and in fact may prefer to wait. So, there will plenty of business for this over the next several weeks, it just won't have a dominant debut. As for Star Trek, I think it will have an outstanding second stanza, charging ahead with less than a 50% drop. Since Trek is being called "this year's Iron Man," I'll point out that Iron Man lost 48% of its opening weekend audience. Star Trek should do better than that, if the daily totals this week are any indication. And that's really all we've got this weekend. Wolverine is mostly dead in the water, and we're a week away from Terminator and Night at the Museum. The Top Five:
1 - Angels & Demons ($57 million)
2 - Star Trek ($43 million)
3 - Wolverine ($11 million)
4 - Ghosts of Girlfriends Past ($6 million)
5 - Obsessed ($4 million)