2013 11 22 – Delivery Man, The Hunger Games: Catching Fire

Counterprogramming and reduction of the number of theaters: these were two reasons last weekend's The Best Man Holiday went high. Higher than all predictions. It doesn't happen that frequent, usually counterprogramming stays on a paper. This time it went live. Good for people who watched it.

This weekend we have two openings.

TUESDAY:  My shots per theater!

FRIDAY:  All shots!

MONDAY:  Official numbers!

-----------------------------------------------

NEXT TIME BETTER SOCK IT, SON

This one, Delivery Man, is a comedy PG-13 movie, from Walt Disney.

Bill Murray. Eddie Murphy. Jim Carrey. Those were names who could single handedly lead a comedy movie. To execute funny contrast they didn't need a sidekick.

Vince Vaughn is a seasoned comedy actor. But he didn't lead his past movies. He has always a bigger name beside. Owen Wilson played a dumber one in Starsky & Hutch, The Wedding Crashers, The Internship. In Four Christmases he shared screen time with Reese Witherspoon, and in The Break Up -- with Jennifer Aniston.

This time he takes all burdens on himself. And he succeeds. The comic premise is interesting (a guy finds out he has about 100 children and helps some of them in life), the character is likable (he positively answers to the story challenge).

Still, his name doesn't drive audience to theaters. On a comedy scale I feel this movie rests close to The Incredible Burt Wonderstone: good entertainment, but you need to be a genre fan.

Shots:

$ 14 mln  --  Laremy Legel, RopeOfSilicon
$ 13,9 mln  --  SaberToothDragon, BoxOfficeFrontier
$ 13,7 mln  --  Ray Subers, BoxOfficeMojo
$ 13 mln  --  C.S. Strowbridge, The-Numbers
$ 13 mln  --  Perri Nemiroff, Shockya
$ 12,5 mln  --  Damon Houx, ScreenCrave
$ 12 mln  --  Mitch Metcalf, ShowBuzzDaily
$ 12 mln  --  ThisIsNotMyName, BoxOfficePredictionsOnline
$ 11,5 mln  --  Edward Douglas, ComingSoon
$ 11 mln  --  Gitesh Pandya, BoxOfficeGuru
$ 10,57 mln  --  Mario Ludwinski, USBOPredictions2013  (3036 theaters, $ 3480 per theater)
$ 10 mln  --  Andy Burns, BiffBamPop
$ 9 mln  --  Box Office team
-----------------------------------------------
$ 7,95 mln  --  the official weekend number of the movie  (3036 theaters, $ 2617 per theater)
$ 7,5 mln  --  Sensei White Lotus, BreitBart

-----------------------------------------------

A JOURNEY TO WOMANHOOD, OR THE RED RIDING HOOD OF 2000s

This one, The Hunger Games: Catching Fire, is a thriller/suspense PG-13 movie, from Lionsgate.

The only thing I need to decide is whether this movie will take the title of The Best Weekend Opening of the Year from hands of Tony Stark and co. Iron Man 3 went for $ 40,946 per theater. It pleased both girls (Robert Downey Jr.) and boys (Robert Downey Jr., various armors) audience. The Hunger Games leans more towards girls than boys (the battle royale element was underdeveloped). I watched the first part (on DVD), and I'm not going to watch the second.

Shots:

$ 195 mln  --  Damon Houx, ScreenCrave
$ 180 mln  --  Gitesh Pandya, BoxOfficeGuru
$ 180 mln  --  Andy Burns, BiffBamPop
$ 177 mln  --  SaberToothDragon, BoxOfficeFrontier
$ 176,3 mln  --  Laremy Legel, RopeOfSilicon
-----------------------------------------------
$ 170 mln  --  ThisIsNotMyName, BoxOfficePredictionsOnline
$ 168 mln  --  C.S. Strowbridge, The-Numbers
$ 168 mln  --  Sensei White Lotus, BreitBart
$ 167 mln  --  Ray Subers, BoxOfficeMojo
$ 167 mln  --  Mitch Metcalf, ShowBuzzDaily
$ 166 mln  --  Box Office team
$ 162,77 mln  --  Mario Ludwinski, USBOPredictions2013  (4163 theaters, $ 39,100 per theater)
$ 162,5 mln  --  Edward Douglas, ComingSoon
$ 160 mln  --  Perri Nemiroff, Shockya
$ 158,07 mln  --  the official weekend number of the movie  (4163 theaters, $ 37,971 per theater)

-----------------------------------------------