In the place to be, don’t believe the hyperbole…
…the slang suggest it was a guy in the glasses
Who came to help the people with they minds and they asses
You set trip and get a grip like Spalding
These walls is thin, feel genuine predictin’…
I’m not a replacement. Just the one for now. To any degree that I don’t fuck things up, credit it all to the last guy. This motherfucker won’t act like he forgot about Dre.
Temp art!
Surely by now Marvel and Thor have come to grips with the fact that they don’t get to be the big dicks that plop out, hit the ground, and cause the summer to start. Last weekend Fast Five ran up and hit the triangle button next to Thor’s custom Hummer (the chrome “U” is switched out with an “A”, and the license reads MJLNIR1), and drove off with the first blockbuster opening of the season, with a surprising late-April blowout. That said, Thor‘s midnight sales have been good and didn’t tally too far behind last week’s midnight receipts for the snowballing car franchise ($3.25m vs. $3.8m respectively). Whatever excitement that indicates, combined with positive reviews and any 3D bump that happens means that Marvel should have another strong release in the bag, even if it can’t match the +$86m opening of Rápido y furioso 5. For over a year now it seems like the question has been, “What happens to The Avengers if Thor or Captain America (or both) flop horrendously?” The answer has always been “mostly nothing” since the road has been so specifically laid out for so long, and ultimately the success of Iron Man means the team-up endeavour would never be a total wash. Even if every other Avenger stand-alone stumbled on the way, the presence of Iron Man and the curiosity of the whole thing more than assures The Avengers a modest return. The only variable is which character gets the most screentime in the TV spots. However, it seems more than probable that Thor will do well enough that no executives have to start shooting nervous looks at each other at Avengers meetings.
At the number two spot, Diesel and crew should have no problem keeping those smiles wide, as it didn’t even take a second weekend for their race movie-cum-heist flick to cross strongly into triple digits, and even with stiff action and date-night competition should swallow up another $35 to $40m, putting it at or over $150, and probably assuring them $220 or so.
Counter programming is a big thing this weekend, as two romantic comedies hit the screens, the icky Something Borrowed (my very displeased review) and Jumping the Broom. While I have no problem wiping my ass with Borrowed and dismissing it as the poorly written nonsense it is, I’m more troubled trying to characterize Jumping the Broom. From the trailers I’ve seen it is much the same as any random romantic comedy, but it also alludes to an African-American tradition/sensibility (i.e. has character) and engages more potent social dilemmas. There’s something nice about seeing a Hollywood romantic comedy filled with darker faces that’s not being treated as an oddity, or marginalized as an “urban film.” Everything about it seems as professional and slick as anything in the genre, and if it draws in “mainstream” folks and the audience that typical frequents Tyler Perry’s marriage-oriented films, then it could be a contender against Something Borrowed. The latter has nearly 1000 more screens though, so the averages will bear it out. The thing is, even without all the Perry-brand mugging and the stigma his involvement brings, the film seems to be as shallow and pandering as Borrowed. So should one celebrate what seems like a quiet victory of normalization, or lament that the victory is simply the progression of bland bullshit pandering to more than just middle-class white women? Maybe the wrong fences are being pulled down. I feel ill-equipped to make an educated guess, but the question has been stuck in my head.
Rounding out the bottom five will surely be Rio, which already crossed the $100m mark that it would need to puff out those chest feathers proudly. Everything else is cake, as the international money is where it’s at. Fox family films excel in that sense. That said, Rio could sweep up another 9 million or so before it moults into the bottom five and then flies off into the horizon (disappearing amidst the brightness of a sun that looks oddly like a digital video disc).
So here’s how it may or may not play out…
Thor ….. $68,500,00
Fast Five ….. $39,000,00
Something Borrowed ….. $12,500,000
Jumping The Broom ….. $12,100,000
Rio ….. $9,000,000
Come back Sunday to wonder what the fuck I was thinking with me.
The thread in which you talk about this stuff.
Thanks to Lauren Drolet for letting me deface her dollar.
18 comments
Nice job, Renn.
Thanks Jacob. You popped a bit of an anxiety bubble that had been blowing up since I hit “publish.”
Renn, I wish you luck champ. Great start. Think Thor will go bigger myself, but I could be talking out of my tea-towel holder.
I was afraid this column would be gone without Dre. Nice to see it still kicking. I was thinking that Thor would go bigger too, but I am a dyed in the wool comic book geek so my world view is pretty skewed
good job Renn, I think Dellamorte would be proud.
Even though most of this businessy stuff goes over my head I always liked Dre’s coverage of it and I’m glad to see it’s still truckin’ as part of CHUD.
Nice one Renn… You may not be the “replacement,” but I have no problem if you stick around.
Great article! Nice amount of comedy and meta-discussion. This is great.
Good job, Renn.
Dellamorte misspelled his name (That extra L there don’t jive with the French version of WordsWithFriends) and he was prone to hitting “publish” before correcting typos. I’d say I’m gonna miss him but I know where to find him. I’m happy to have another site of writers to discover.
Yeah but I still love CHUD. Always has been a great group of writers. People should stop bitching about the waves on the beach.
Good job Renn. I enjoyed reading this and that matters most.
Good job, Renn!
snowballing car franchise, does that mean a car that likes its own semen spit back into its mouth? Gonna have to heckle you a bit at first Renn, still pissed Dre/Damon is gone, amazing wall o text you have submitted.
Glad to see this column continuing. Good job Renn! I hope Thor takes in that amount if not a tad higher. Glad to see Fast Five doing so strong. Lets hope it becomes the series highest grosser!
My opinion? This should continue to be called “Dellamorte Does Box Office”.. no matter who writes it (though you did a good job this week, so thanks, Renn! : )
CHUD owns the “Andre Dellamorte” pseudonym, and should put it to use for this section of the site going forward. Before he left, Damon eventually reached a place where he felt he’d out grown the ‘Andre’ deception. Ultimately, he opted not to use that alias and publish his reports under his given name instead. Damon has now gone, and he will be missed. The reports he filed as Dellamorte were excellent, no doubt, and I read them for years. With that said, how about CHUD takes a Lee Tamahori inspired approach to the problem? Much like the designs Lee Tamahori had for the James Bond franchise, I see a way that CHUD could maintain continuity while trying out new writing talent: Dellamorte is a <i>code name</i>, not an individual. Whoever takes over the column next could put in time publishing under the Andre Dellamorte alias, until such a time that they’ve established their talent and suitability for the role of BO analysis, at which point CHUD would benefit from the drama of a new unveiling as the current “Dellamorte” reveals their true identity to the world
The cycle of secret identity/unveiling could continue then each and every time there is a new BO writer!
That’s my opinion, anyway
CHUD in no way owns the Andre Dellamorte pseudonym. It’s Damon’s, and is uniquely associated with Damon. It’s not a phantom figure for other people to take up. I don’t think CHUD will be getting into the Stig-like controversy business.
I appreciate that you still enjoyed the column though, and appreciate the suggestion regardless.
Oh no worries, and thanks for thinking about my idea anyway, Renn. Whatever the this column is called going forward, I will continue to read it as always
Film making is an art form inextricably linked to business and moneyed interests, and to truly understand the comings and goings in Hollywood, I feel I need to be familiar with how things are shaking out in the BO. In my ongoing quest to make sense of the numbers rolling in each week, CHUD will continue to be an invaluable resource for me
Thanks again for the great content!
PS 68 Million for THOR? A healthy haul for Branagh’s epic, should the final numbers match your initial guesstimate. I’ll cross my fingers!
Lee Tamahori inspired?
Dellamorte got his name from the film “Dellamorte Dellamore” which was one of the names of a character in the film and is spelt quite correctly – in Italian.
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