Articles

December 28, 2011
 

Box Office Results TUESDAY December 27

>Box office volume came back down to a normal level on Tuesday, with the top 10 films grossing a collective $45.5 million (up slightly from the $40-42 million for the December 27 date when it also fell on an early weekday in 2005, 2006 and 2011).  The torrid pace on Monday has been adjusted down to $61.8 (from an initial estimate of $67.8 million), still a very impressive number however. 

                DAILY TOTAL GROSS of TOP 10 MOVIES
           2011        2010        2006        2005
Dec 21  $27.5 Wed   $22.0 Tue   $17.8 Thu   $20.5 Wed
Dec 22  $24.8 Thu   $31.1 Wed   $39.6 Fri   $22.8 Thu
Dec 23  $37.1 Fri   $33.5 Thu   $43.3 Sat   $36.4 Fri
Dec 24  $22.1 Sat   $23.6 Fri   $20.1 Sun   $20.2 Sat
Dec 25  $54.5 Sun   $52.5 Sat   $49.4 Mon   $41.4 Sun
Dec 26  $61.8*Mon   $48.8 Sun   $49.5 Tue   $55.2 Mon
Dec 27  $45.5 Tue   $41.6 Mon   $41.9 Wed   $40.1 Tue
Dec 28        Wed   $41.6 Tue   $39.9 Thu   $37.8 Wed
Dec 29        Thu   $41.7 Wed   $48.5 Fri   $38.1 Thu
Dec 30        Fri   $43.1 Thu   $51.5 Sat   $45.1 Fri
Dec 31        Sat   $41.7 Fri   $34.1 Sun   $35.8 Sat
Jan 01        Sun   $57.1 Sat   $41.0 Mon   $42.6 Sun

*-Mon Dec 26 adjusted down from $67.8 million

NOTE: Top films: 2010 (Little Fockers, True Grit, TRON Legacy), 2006 (Night at the Museum, Pursuit of Happyness, Dreamgirls), 2005 (King Kong, Chronicles of Narnia, Fun with Dick and Jane)

In this week between Christmas and New Year’s, when a weekday generates box office returns similar to a normal weekend daily number, Mission: Impossible — Ghost Protocol remains the movie to beat.  Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows is a very respectable second place, and both films at the top exhibited a fairly normal drop from Monday to Tuesday.  Films with a sizable kid audience (Alvin, Tintin and We Bought a Zoo) had much lower than average declines from Monday to Tuesday, but the latter two are not setting the world on fire.  Interestingly, War Horse had the biggest drop on Tuesday.  Because of its late release date (Sunday, December 25), War Horse has a lot of ground to make up compared to the other films and it really needs to do better than $4.3 million on a day like Tuesday (ranking 7th on the day, after ranking 3rd Monday) to stay relevant.

Domestic Box Office (millions)   MON-     MON     TUE    TUE
                                  TUE    Dec26   Dec27  vs MON
Mission: Impossible 4    (Par)   $24.2   $14.6   $ 9.6   -34%
Sherlock Holmes 2         (WB)   $18.1   $10.8   $ 7.3   -32%
Alvin & Chipmunks 3      (Fox)   $13.8   $ 6.9   $ 6.8   – 2%
Girl with Dragon Tattoo (Sony)   $11.4   $ 6.7   $ 4.7   -31%
War Horse                (Dis)   $11.2   $ 7.0   $ 4.3   -41%
Adventures of Tintin     (Par)   $10.0   $ 5.4   $ 4.6   -15%
We Bought a Zoo          (Fox)   $ 9.5   $ 5.2   $ 4.3   -18%
New Year’s Eve            (WB)   $ 3.5   $ 1.9   $ 1.7   -12%
Darkest Hour             (Sum)   $ 3.5   $ 2.1   $ 1.5   -30%
The Muppets              (Dis)   $ 2.1   $ 1.1   $ 1.0   -10%


Top 10                                   $61.8   $45.5   -26%

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About the Author

Mitch Salem
MITCH SALEM has worked on the business side of the entertainment industry for 20 years, as a senior business affairs executive and attorney for such companies as NBC, ABC, USA, Syfy, Bravo, and BermanBraun Productions, and before that, at the NY law firm of Weil, Gotshal & Manges. During all that, he has more or less constantly been going to the movies and watching TV, and writing about both since the 1980s. His film reviews also currently appear on screened.com and the-burg.com. In addition, he is co-writer of an episode of the television series "Felicity."