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Box office palooza, weekend update: Story behind Toy Story, is 3-D topping out?
A question mark in a solid weekend. Disney’s Toy Story 3 [TOYS3] opened stronger than we modeled and generally met expectations for a robust performance in a weekend that was very solid, in line with our forecast. However, we see one slightly negative point in this otherwise upbeat story, evidence that 3-D may be topping out.
The story behind Toy Story. Toy Story 3 opened with domestic box office of $109M, $13.7M above our estimate, the biggest Pixar opening ever and the second biggest for an animated movie, after DreamWorks Animation’s Shrek 3, which took in $122M in 2007. However, 60% of Toy Story 3’s receipts and we estimate 50.8% of its attendance were in 3-D, slightly below the 51.8% of audience that saw Shrek 4 [SHRK4] in 3-D and well below the 63.1% and 61.7% of attendance for Avatar and Alice in Wonderland, respectively. We read this as cautionary, suggesting a peak in the percent of audience that will pay extra to see a major movie in 3-D. Neither Shrek 4 nor Toy Story 3 was constrained by 3-D screen count.
Weekend rundown. Box office for the top 12 movies over the weekend was only $1M above our model, totaling $187.9M, up 29.3% y/y, according to preliminary estimates from boxofficemojo.com. Upside from Toy Story 3 was offset by a $7.5M miss by Jonah Hex [JOHEX], an adaptation of a DC Comic from Warner Bros., starring Josh Brolin and Megan Fox, which flopped with an opening tally of only $5.1M. Shrek Forever After was hit a bit harder by Toy Story 3 than we had modeled, with $5.5M vs. our $7.0M estimate. Profits for Shrek 4 will now be driven by international box in core markets after the World Cup and also by 4Q10 DVD sales.
Industry box office view. We are making slight changes to our industry box office estimates, but holding to levels near the assumptions behind our below-consensus estimates for HOLD-rated theater companies Cinemark and Regal. We now see 2Q10 domestic box office down 5.7% and 3Q10 up 6.0%.
Next weekend outlook. We forecast a 22.8% y/y drop in box office for the top 12 movies next weekend to $148.9 million, with Disney/Pixar’s Toy Story 3 hanging on to the top spot with $59.8 million in its second weekend. We see Sony’s Grown Ups [GRWUP], with Adam Sandler, second with $33.4 million in its opening weekend, followed by Fox’s Knight and Day [KNDAY], starring Tom Cruise and Cameron Diaz, with $15.6 million, also in its opening weekend. Last year’s top movie, Transformers 2, made $108.9 million in its first weekend.
Tag(s): TOYS3, SHRK4, JOHEX, GRWUP, KNDAY
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By Barton Crockett on Tuesday, June 22, 2010 @ 02:57 PM
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