January 2009 will make over $1Billion Club

Hey everyone, I'm back. And my prediction here is that January 2009 will make over $1 billion total. The current January record is 2008 with $854 million.

It has movies for:
women: Bride Wars (which is tracking like a blockbuster), and New in Town
men: Gran Torino
families: Nickelodeon's Hotel for Dogs, Paul Blart, Inkheart
urban audience: Notorious (which also has rap fans), and Not Easily Broken
horror audience: My Bloody Valentine 3D (tracking like a blockbuster), Underworld 3, The Unborn, The Uninvited
plus Oscar calibar movies like The Reader, the Dark Knight re-issue, and then there's all of the big movies out now (Marley and Me, Benjamin Button which will get Oscar legs, and Bedtime Stories)

thoughts?

I don't think it'll even beat last year let alone hit 1 Billion. Bride Wars will do very well, but the economy will keep more people at home than it sends to the theatres. My gut tells me that this isn't the year.

The Reader has flopped in wide release (just $530,000 on opening day) and The Dark Knight won't do much in the reissue especially since lots of people already have the DVD. And people who haven't seen will simply rent the DVD because it's cheaper.

I own TDK on dvd. I plan on seeing it again in the re-issue. On this topic however, I'm gonna say no.

this year will do less than last year. I would only see TDK again in IMAX, but we dont have one around here

About 20 theaters have added an IMAX screen since the Dark Knight came out. And I'm sure those theaters (like mine) will be flooding with people. But that doesn't have too much to do with the goal I've set. Here's my view:

Marley and Me will make over $100 million easily in January, and The Curious Case of Benjamin Button could too if it won Best Picture at the Golden Globes and then got an Oscar nom right after that. Bedtime Stories is holding up well. So overall, we have almost $100 million just after TWO DAYS. (However I was going to make this thread before that.) Then Bride Wars comes out and has $100 million buzz, even though I don't think that will happen. Plus that weekend you have Gran Torino, which will do well, The Unborn, which will be the first horror film since Molly Hartley. The next weekend, the four day weekend, you have My Bloody Valentine 3D, which looks to be a shocking movie, and the first of its kind, and tracking is showing that people are responding. Most of the people who will see this probably haven't even seen a movie in RealD yet. Then you have Notorious, which will do really well in big cities, and Hotel for Dogs, all of which are aimed at completely different audiences. The next weekend has Underworld 3 and Inkheart. Add in Not Easily Broken, Paul Blart, The Uninvited, New in Town, and all of the other holdovers, and I think this could happen.

I think it will be about 800 million total.

Not in. There is genre overload this month. Too many horror flicks will slow down the market considerably. Also, while there is a easy comparison to the late run of National Treasure 2(Marley and Me), Juno (Slumdog Millionaire), 27 Dresses (Bride Wars) and the Bucket List (Gran Torino), there isn't a big power Cloverfield like punch. I don't see much of any of the family films breaking out with them piled on top of each other like that.

I was thinking that the combo of My bloody Valentine, Notorious, and Hotel for Dogs would be bigger than Cloverfield.

But even still, that would only allow this year to perform similarly to last, not go on and substantially beat it.

According to Box Office Mojo we are already well over one-fifth of the way there in just four days.

Not well over.. more like just at one 5th. But this is also going to be the biggest weekend of the month. It will decline from here. You will probably see only one 20 + million opener for the rest of the month.

ReelSource tracking: http://talk.hsx.com/films/post.htm?1231135223.notfabio

Unborn: Between 10-13
Bride Wars: Between 26-29
My Bloody Valentine: Low 30's (4 day)
Paul Blart: High Single Digits (4 day)
Hotel For Dogs: Between 8-11 (4 day)

I just cant see my Bloody Valentine doing that well. Also see Hotel for Dogs doing better than that.

I don't see either one doing that well. My Bloody Valentine will do poorly in the theatres running it flat (because the footage in 2-D looks poor and in DTV quality) while possibly having a couple good weeks in 3-D before being dropped for Coraline. I'd say $17 million opening. Meanwhile, Hotel For Dogs just doesn't seem that appealing plus the trailer seems to put emphasis on gross-out humor and cuteness more than anything (I'm sure that the "I made cinnamon" line after Lisa Kudrow puts a wooden spoon licked a dog in her mouth has turned off a few viewers) and since Marley and Me will still be running by then, I don't think that Hotel For Dogs will get much of an audience on opening weekend. $7 million opening.

Meanwhile, I think Paul Blart: Mall Cop and Notorious will open better. Paul Blart was produced by Adam Sandler, who made The House Bunny of all things a hit, and the trailer makes it look like a Home Alone (for the comedy and the characters)/Die Hard (for the action and the plotline) hybrid. Plus, Kevin James has more appeal than Emma Roberts and actually has a hit on his resume. $11-12 million opening. Notorious has been long awaited (seriously, it was in development hell for years) and now that it's finally been made, the fans will flock to see on opening weekend. $21 million opening.

I can also see Gran Torino taking $20 million in its first weekend of expansion. With $32,000 per theatre this week (in 84 theatres no less), it makes you wonder what it can do in wide release. Can it be another Million Dollar Baby in terms of numbers?

I think there are way too many big numbers being thrown around. This is January!

Everyone forgot that LAST January too, what with all the Cloverfield $150 million speculation...

J.I., with Gran Tornio's estimated success and if My Bloody Valentine lives up to it's tracking, you just might be right!

I KNOW A MOVIE THAT'S GOING TO HIT THE $100 MILLION MARK!

So, about Gran Torino. If it has the same multiple in wide release that The Bucket List had, it would make $155 million. Dang.

http://www.boxofficemojo.com/alltime/weekends/top12sum.htm?page=01&p=.htm

We already have the 2nd and 3rd biggest January weekends ever.

*lol* Bang that drum J.I., but I don't think it'll make much of a difference.

That said, I've got ten movies I'm trying to see this month -- an atypically high January for me -- and I'm sure that there are enough other film fanatics like me!

It's the same for me -- trying to catch up on all the awards-nominated movies. Slumdog Millionaire and Doubt have already expanded wide enough to be near me, and so has Gran Torino, but I'm still waiting on Frost/Nixon and Milk...

Hats off J.I. This weekend beat Cloverfield's weekend by over 40 M. You called this one for sure.

I still dont think it'll make over $1B, You need $400M in the next two weeks