Box Office Club

€950,000. This is the verdict forthe first day of 2012, thus confirming that the movie is an important Blockbuster for the Italian market, at the same level of I Am Legend or The War of the Worlds. 2012 could close the weekend at around 4.5 million but with a bit of luck it might even get close to 5 Million: considering a Sunday without Serie A, the Sony action/drama can indeed aim for the big result.

Almodovar should have settled for nearly €160,000, exactly the same result as Volver (which opened in May 2006): thanks to the focus on the female audience, today Los Abrazos Rotos can do better than Public Enemy (€190.000 yesterday). To equalize the 1.050.000 of Volver’s first weekend the movie needs a €500,000 Saturday, a figure within the reach of the film.

Just like we had predicted, the strong competition was too much for Beyond a Reasonable Doubt, that showed critical difficulties to carve some space: the €50.000 netted yesterday don’t bode well for the  thriller with Oscar-winning Michael Douglas.

Today 2012 arrives in nearly 550 screens: it’’s the new film by Roland Emmerich who, after the excursion into the past with 10,000 BC, €5 Million last year, returns to the disaster-futuristic film genre of which he marked key stages in the 90s with Stargate and Independence Day, and took over with profit in 2004 with The Day After (10 million). From 2012 we expect a weekend of about 4 million.

350 screens for Almodovar’s Los Abrazos Rotos: the director returns after the excellent result of Volver, 7 million. For a strange coincidence of fate, again a Sony blockbuster will be released concurrently with Almodovar, offering a good alternative for the schedule. In 2006 it was The Da Vinci Code, this time it will be 2012. The over-60 Spanish director, Oscar for Parla con Lei, director of reference for quality cinema, can  aim to the female audience to secure a 1 million weekend and lay the basis for a result to be developed over time.

Little chance for Beyond a Reasonable Doubt: the noir with Michael Douglas, that had very little luck abroad, is likely to shatter against 2012 and not exceed €500,000 despite the 200 screens in which it will be played.

Public Enemy closed the week at 2.8 million, The Man Who Stare at goats at 1.6 million. Up has exceeded 14 million and for the weekend aims at 15.

These are our predictions:

1. 2012 – 4 M

2. Public Enemy – 1,4 M

3. Los Abrazos Rotos – 1,1 M

Challenge us at the BoxOfficeCup, the round is still open…

2 Million and more for Public Enemy. This is the response of the last weekend, in which we saw Up steady in its second position with a remarkable 1.35M Box Office on its fourth weekend. Third place for the new entry The man who stare at goats, shortly before Parnassus: the movie is surely one of the most positive surprises of the entire film season.

Public Enemy has been awarded first with a 2 million Box Office and an opening slightly smaller than  Collateral, which closed with a 7 million final Box Office. The gangster movie by Universal had also a good per-screen average, with more than €5,000.

Good result for Up in the second position: the movie netted a great figure in its fourth weekend, reaching almost 14 million and surpassing the total income of Cars. Ratatouille is 4 million away, we’ll see what happens over the next 4 weekends.

Approximately €1,200,000 for The man who stare at goats, that produced the second higher per-screen average of the weekend, nearly €4,400.

Following, there is Parnassus with €1,075,000 and an excellent total Box Office of 6 million. Despite the weekly incomes, in the weekend This Is It (700,000) has suffered more than Amore 14 (830,000): the documentary about Jackson has collected €3,700,000 so far, 1 million more than Moccia’s movie.

As the last part of the World to distribute the film, today Italy welcomes in 400 screens Public Enemy, the latest work by Michael Mann that has collected its highest income in France with about 12 million dollars. So we’re not talking about a blockbuster, even if Public Enemy is a gangster movie that might well agree with the tastes of Italian audience. Mann is had €3.5 million from Miami Vice and has experienced his greatest exploits with Heat and more recently with Collateral’s 7 Million. In our predictions Public Enemy could open with 2.5 million over the weekend.

Another film coming out this weekend is The Man Who Stare at Goats by Medusa, a comedy with George Clooney out in over 250 screens. It is difficult to repeat the excellent result of Burn After Reading (6 million), but it’s possible that the film will be able to collect about 1 million in the weekend, for an average of 3200 screens.

This Is It closed the first 9 days of programming close to 3 million and for the weekend it aims to reach 4 million. Parnassus has almost reached 5 million and in the weekend could take an additional million to close around 7 million.

Amore 14 has got bad result even on weekdays and now it is in danger of losing 50% of the audience. Proportionately on weekdays Oggi Sposi did better, having lost just a few viewers compared to a week ago.

Also, today in a few screens in Italy will be released Alza La Testa and Marpiccolo.

These are our predictions for the weekend:

1. Public Enemy - 2,5 Million

2. UP – 1,2 Million

3. Parnassus – 1,05 Million

Disappointing weekend for the new releases. Both This Is It and Amore 14 had a bad start and two old acquaintances, UP and Parnassus, were able to maintain the leading positions.

Up almost reached 12 Million thanks to a weekend when it still lost 45% of the audience: 1.75 million the result of Pixar’s 3D.

In the second place an extraordinary Parnassus lost just the 20% compared to 7 days ago and in the weekend collected 1.55 million for a fantastic 4.3 million partial in 10 days. Parnassus in the weekend had a per-screen average of €5,500, almost twice of This Is It (€3,000).

This Is It comes in the third place just before Amore 14: 1,46M versus 1,41M. A disappointing result for both films, although in terms of the downsizing around the world of the documentary on Michael Jackson, the Italian result, 2.15M in 5 days, is not so bad.

Completely overrated Amore 14: the phenomenon Moccia has taken on a much smaller slice of public (-70% compared with Scusa Ma Ti Chiamo Amore) with his second attempt as a director.

The fifth position is occupied by Oggi Sposi, that loses 30% and reaches 2 million. Julie & Julia did well with 1.2 million. Awful result for Capitalism: A Love Story, which with just 100 screens produced an average of less than 1500 Euro. Proportionally has done better, so to speak, The white ribbon with €120,000 from 42 screens.