The first numbers are in!
Posted by norbert_numberguy 12 years, 6 months ago to Movies
First estimate of Friday take, at BoxOfficeMojo: $692,000. That compares to $674,000 for the first day of Part 1, or a 3% increase over last time around.
It's impossible to tell from just one day and just one number, but if 3% is the general trend, then the total theatrical take for Part II will be $4.76 million (3% over $4.63 million), leaving the $16 million production about $11 million in the whole, with two thirds of the budget unrecovered. I would be surprised if the numbers were that bad, but they just may be, and we have to be ready for that.
The only notable high point of the Part 1 release is that it had a relatively high take per screen ($2254 on the first day), and that was used as an argument for adding more screens to the release. This time around it's much lower, $684 per screen, maybe just enough to get it into the top ten by the skin of its teeth for the first week, but a very weak position to start from.
So it's time to start thinking about what it means if this one does as badly as the last one did, or only 3% better than the first one did. Part 1 earned about a million in DVD/BluRay sales (about $3 million in sales, with an industry rule-of-thumb 30% of MSRP going to the studio) and probably not much more in home rentals. Assuming comparable numbers means Part II also ends up deep in the red.
The first movie was funded out of pocket by John Aglialoro. This time around, Aglialoro and Harmon were unable to raise all the money they wanted for Part II (he wanted to raise $25 million in a private debt sale but could only find $16 million) and if these numbers hold, raising money the same way for Part III gets just much, much harder. That is, Aglialoro was willing to gamble, but when you've had two episodes of a trilogy go down in flames, investing in the third is no longer a gamble but a pretty certain loss.
Of course its possible that the film will start doing better. But the reviews have been cataclysmic (currently 0% at Rotten Tomatoes, something I don't think I've ever seen before) and the opportunities for growth just don't seem to be there.
It's impossible to tell from just one day and just one number, but if 3% is the general trend, then the total theatrical take for Part II will be $4.76 million (3% over $4.63 million), leaving the $16 million production about $11 million in the whole, with two thirds of the budget unrecovered. I would be surprised if the numbers were that bad, but they just may be, and we have to be ready for that.
The only notable high point of the Part 1 release is that it had a relatively high take per screen ($2254 on the first day), and that was used as an argument for adding more screens to the release. This time around it's much lower, $684 per screen, maybe just enough to get it into the top ten by the skin of its teeth for the first week, but a very weak position to start from.
So it's time to start thinking about what it means if this one does as badly as the last one did, or only 3% better than the first one did. Part 1 earned about a million in DVD/BluRay sales (about $3 million in sales, with an industry rule-of-thumb 30% of MSRP going to the studio) and probably not much more in home rentals. Assuming comparable numbers means Part II also ends up deep in the red.
The first movie was funded out of pocket by John Aglialoro. This time around, Aglialoro and Harmon were unable to raise all the money they wanted for Part II (he wanted to raise $25 million in a private debt sale but could only find $16 million) and if these numbers hold, raising money the same way for Part III gets just much, much harder. That is, Aglialoro was willing to gamble, but when you've had two episodes of a trilogy go down in flames, investing in the third is no longer a gamble but a pretty certain loss.
Of course its possible that the film will start doing better. But the reviews have been cataclysmic (currently 0% at Rotten Tomatoes, something I don't think I've ever seen before) and the opportunities for growth just don't seem to be there.
