Predicting the Movie Hits and Bombs of 2015

Biggest Clint Eastwood opening ever?

 

Sales are through the roof. It'd be surprising if this film tanks at this point.

 

Wonder what the demographic is. Probably wives/girlfriends/mistresses dragging their poor SO along. On the other hand, wannabe boyfriends might be milking it also!

 

Yep. I called it.

 

women. Apparently the nay sayers thought that was a niche market

 

Well, Guy Maddin makes movies for me, but according to imdb the American theater gross on his last picture was $22,000, which didn't include my $10 ($20, my wife would have gone, too) because it didn't play in my town. Baz Luhrmann is as close as I can think of to a moneyed director who make movies for me, maybe Tarrentino.

 

I'm betting it has a huge opening weekend and then declines precipitously after that. It smells like a "girls night out" event that won't get repeat business - I think it'll make all its bucks upfront...

 

Maybe. But if it works, if it captures whatever the book captured this sucker will be off the charts and the girls will come back over and over again just like they did for Titanic.

 

You could be right - I don't have a great familiarity with the book, so I don't know how "rewatchable" it'll be.

Just going with my gut here. It's hard for a movie that relies intensely on one demo to sustain popularity, and given its next-to-nil appeal to men, I think that'll limit "Shades".

"Titanic" may have a reputation as a "chick flick", but it sold tickets to MANY demographics. No movie makes as much money as that one did based on sales to one audience.

I think the "Twilight" movies show the limits to which "one audience sales" can go. Those did extremely well but were limited almost entirely to sales to women - and mainly women in their teens to 40s. The films had little crossover appeal - if they'd been able to market to men better, they would've sold off the charts, IMO...

 

So, guys don't like movies with hot/steamy sex scenes? Wow, first time I've heard that!

 

If it does Twilight numbers I am sure the producers will settle for that

 

You have a point!

But I think "50 Shades" was/is an almost entirely female-driven phenomenon. I think no matter how much hot female skin may appear in the movie - and I have no idea what that'll be - guys associate it as a "chick flick". It's a seamier "chick flick" than the usual fare, but it's still firmly in the realm of product oriented toward women.

So I think it's going to be a very, very tough sell for men...

 

Oh, I agree 100%! I don't think it'll do as well because it's "R"-rated, so there goes a lot of those tween/teen sales that pushed "Twilight" so high.

I brought up "Twilight" to illustrate the limits of "one-demographic ticket sales". "Titanic" exploded because everybody went to see it. "Twilight" did incredibly well but was still held back due to its essentially lack of appeal to males...

 

yeah but it could be the ultimate date movie. think about it

 

By far.

 

I'm still thinking "no". That "R"-rating loses a lot of teens, and I still think guys are gonna avoid it. Some will get dragged with sig others, but I still suspect it'll be much more of a movie for groups of women than for dates.

It sure doesn't seem like a movie that people would go to on "early dates". It doesn't seem especially "date night" friendly to me, to be honest - "date night" films tend to be more "PG-13" and light, not stuff that seems to border on porn...

 

Let me put it this way. I have no interest in seeing this movie. OTOH if a certain lady asks me to take her...I'm buying two tickets. Good chance I'm getting more than my money's worth.

 

We kept hoping that "into the Woods" would come here...but it didn't arrive within 120 miles. My local theaters said Disney was "keeping it limited" even though it supposedly had good numbers.

 

Make that 90... and it has MLK day - should be at 100 mil just for the 4 day weekend. Big numbers. Good for Mr. Eastwood. I'm still curious why Spielberg pulled out of the project.

 

"Into the Woods" played at a peak of more than 2800 screens. That's "limited" compared to super-wide releases - for instance, the last "Transformers" movie appeared on about 4200 screens - but I still wouldn't call 2800 screens "limited".

Weird that your local would make it sound like it only played "select theaters", as though it was some "art house" flick like "Foxcatcher", which never played on more than 750ish screens...

 

Boom-chicka-wow-wow! I foresee a sequel: "50 Shades of Wheeler"!

 

Kaboom for Blackhat

from Variety

Blackhat is quickly proving to be the first box-office bomb of 2015, despite its topicality in light of the hacking of Sony (reportedly by North Korea) and the star power of Chris Hemsworth. The action thriller, earning a dismal C- CinemaSocre, came in No. 11 for the three-day weekend with only $4 million for a projected four-day debut of $4.6 million, a major stumble considering its $70 million production budget

 

"Taken 3" already pulled in 0ver $160 million worldwide vs. a production cost of $50 million....and it's still going. Looks like another winner for Neeson.

 

Very interesting that Blackhat made less than $5M -- a significant bomb for director/writer Michael Mann -- while Clint Eastwood's American Sniper is going to go past $90M. I would've been much more conservative on those numbers: I would've predicted Blackhat would do OK but not great at twice that, and Eastwood's film to do half that. Amazing how unpredictable this stuff is...

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/box-office-shocker-american-sniper-764330

And in the meantime Hobbit 3 is poised to cross $800 million at the box office, so it's pretty assured that all three of those films will have made $1B each by the time the dust settles.

 

LOL! no way man...too bad. LOL!