DELLAMORTE'S BOX OFFICE WRAP UP – 8/15/08

This just in: Adult Content, Monster Violence, and extreme sexuality.

It held the top slot for four weeks, but now it’s out. So, boo-hoo-hoo, The Dark Knight will have to make due with being the #2 highest grossing film of all time (non-adjusted). By the time The Shield starts its final season, the film should be comfortably over the half a billion hurdle domestically. It will also shortly top Indy IV as the year’s most successful picture worldwide, though the film may not get to a billion all told. With Harry Potter moved to 2009, it’s the film of the year. As Sinead O’Connor sang (with words provided by Prince Rogers Nelson), nothing compares.

Tropic Thunder took the weekend, and that’s good for it in the sense that it’s the #1 film in America, which marketers seem to love to use in their ads. Does it help? Probably not, but it’s a good hook, I guess. It may yet get to $100 Million. But the film cost nearly $100 Million to make. You know what that spells? Paramount. Jesus Christ. Such a strange thing that. Which means that they’d better hope for good DVD sales. It managed $37 Million for its five-day, so it did about three million more than Pineapple Express did last weekend, but in total is $4 Million behind. In some ways that’s good, it means that Pineapple had a quick-hit factor, then again, the numbers are suggesting that TT did as much business on Friday as it will do on Sunday. They may be estimating a bit high. Pineapple took a 57% plunge and is really going to have to work hard to make it to $100, which isn’t out of the question, but kinda unlikely at this point. The only good news for all these films is that the next few weeks of movies are terrible-looking.

The Clone Wars opened Friday to $6.5 Million, and I though it might be a Friday picture for the faithful. It turns out that it was the best number, and though some are suggesting it gets to $50, my guess is that it’s already petering out, and should stop around $40. If most of the faithful don’t care for it, and the best it gets is a modest “meh, it’s not that bad” from those that like it, I can’t see any hardcore fans going back and back, and it’s also a TV thing. We shall see.

Man I ate a lot of cheese yesterday. Everything had cheese on or in it. Today is all about the fruits and vegetables.

Fox didn’t seem to care too much about Mirrors, and Kieffer Sutherland probably did it on hiatus as a favor (or got paid well, dunno). Whatever the case, it better hope that unrated DVD is kick-ass. And there’s no getting around it: Fox is having one hell of a shitty summer. But it’s not like they tried. They’re going to finish out the summer with The Rocker and Babylon A.D.. Waa-wah. Mirrors is doing the sort of business that Asian-themed horror films do, which is around $25.

The Mummy should get to $100, but it’s all about international for that title. It’s already at $141 internationally, but it’s the sort of film that probably should have been a bit more than a two-base hit. Sufficed to say, unless another strike rolls around, this is the end of that franchise. Again, the bigger success for Universal is Mamma Mia! which already has doubled its reported budget, and barely took a dent this week. Maybe it gets to $130-140. Not so shabby.

Traveling Pants 2 was also a strike movie, and may have more of a life on home video. It’s like a sorbet, this, a palate cleanser. And also, WB can say they had bigger priority protecting their Dark Knight. Step Brothers looks like it should just get to $100 in a week or two.Vicky Christina Barcelona did good business for a Woody Allen film, might get to $10. That’s something. How big will Death Race be? Only that owl from the Tootsie Pops knows for sure.