Previsión taquilla Estados Unidos

23 noviembre 2007

Thanksgiving weekend is famous among production companies by stronger movie grosses. Moreover, this year will be more important because blockbuster last poor results such as Beowulf, Fred Claus or Bee Movie had prompted that studios are alarmed by the audience reactions.

Traditionally, Thanksgiving is a quite good holiday to release family and child films as Happy Feet and Harry Potter and an opportunity to keep a good level of grosses to other movies. This year four titles fight to catch the moviegoers’ attention: Disney’s comedy Enchanted, Warner’s fantasy drama August Rush, Fox’s action thriller Hitman and MGM’s new horror pic The Mist. Each of them in more than 2,200 sites and wrapped by terrific promotion campaign which has encroached all American cities.

Disney will release Enchanted in more than 3,500 locations and aims to climb the number one by far. Disney’s fairy tale is a mixed of 2-D animation and real images as ¿Who farmed Roger Rabbit? and Mary Poppins. More important, Enchanted has a particularly taste that only we can find in some magic films which can connect with different kinds of audience.

In my opinion, the promotion of Enchanted is similar to Shrek, both of them has boosted the ironic and comic side of the plot. That could be the key to fill the cinemas with audiences among 5 to 60 years-old and obtain $60M gross. Enchanted looks different to Fred Claus, Mr.Magorium or Beowulf because Disney’s film has obtained excellent reviews and comments among moviegoer forums and the company is confident that its film will achieve a warm start among families.

The other three weekend releases don’t seem to be successful in its first weekend, in particular August Rush, mainly for the strong competition of other similar titles.

The Mist will be bow in 2’200 sites by MGM. Stephen King’s famous best seller adaptation could catch the attention of teenagers which are looking for a horror experience. I think Darabont’s film will lose audiences during Friday to Sunday because the movie hasn’t been made to attract young audience. The mist will end its first frame with less than $14M.

However, Hitman is a film made to younger aud. The videogame adaptation is a good opportunity to pry teens away from its v.g. consoles as Resident Evil did. Fox bows the film in 2,700 sites and is convinced which the film can fill multiplexes enough to gross $30M during first 5-days.

Hitman has on its side the action and violence plot and Fox has made trailers and TV spots which show it. Obviously, the film hasn’t obtained good reviews, but that doesn’t matter in this kind of movies.

The other two big releases are This Christmas and August Rush. The firs one is an Afroamerican family comedy which has the chance to call the same audience as Why I get married? attracted five weeks ago. The movie will gross close to $25M, a very good first frame for a movie with $10-15M budget.

August Rush is the weekend loser by far. The film released by Warner has two much competence (Enchanted, This Christmas, Bee Movie and more) and the trailers and TV spots are not very enthusiastic. The movie is about a boy who wants to meet his parents. Warner has made such a sad promotion which I think that nobody wants to see this film. My prediction is less than $11M in five days.

Last week release Beowulf will keep a good level of revenues thanks by the 3-D theaters which are screening the movie. Last week these cinemas grossed more than $14,000 per sala, and this mini-holiday the numbers could rise considerably. Zemeckis’ last movie will gross during this five days close to $25M and cume more than $55M.

Moreover, family films Bee Movie and Fred Claus will keep the children audience and is possible that both of them can gross $14M more or less.

My 5-days prediction is:

Pau Brunet