The 2015 Summer Movie Wager: A Game Of Box Office Predictions

Its that time of year again. Jeff Cannata (formerly of the Totally Rad Show, now host of DLC, We Have Concerns and co-host of the /Filmcast) has thrown down the gauntlet, and once again challenged /Film to compete with him in what has become an annual tradition: the Summer Movie Wager. Every year in the past I would make a guest appearance on the Totally Rad Show for this segment, but with that show now disbanded we have taken on the job of hosting this contest on /Film. This is the ninth annual edition of this contest.

This year the contest includes David Chen (his first time) Germain Lussier (with a write-in ballot), Jeff Cannata and myself in a game is to decide what will be the highest grossing films of the Summer. It's a free-for-all; the person with the best score wins. But it isn't just that easy — not only do the participants need to predict what 10 films will be the highest grossing films domestically, but we need to place them in order. After the jump you can listen to the full episode of the show with our predictions.

2015 Summer Movie Wager Podcast:

Download the episode or play it in your browser below:

2015 Summer Movie Wager Rules

The rules for the game come from TimeTravelReview's Summer Movie Pool:

The object is to pick the films that you think will be the top-ten grossing films of the summer, in order of box-office performance. As I've said, that means only films released from May 1st 2012 to the Labor Day weekend, counting only the money those films make domestically (US and Canada) in that period. In other words films from March or April might still be making money after May 1st, but they don't count; films released from May on could start racking up foreign B.O., but that doesn't count; films released from May on could still be making money into September, but that doesn't count either. Box Office numbers are generally available late Monday or Tuesday after the weekend closes. For the last seven or so years, I have been using box office numbers from Yahoo Box Office which gets their numbers in turn from Box Office Mojo. So what you will be doing is figuring out what 10 films will make the most money, and putting them in order of what you think they will gross at the box office. BUT, in addition to your top 10, you get to pick 3 "Dark Horses"- films you think *might* make it, but that you are not confident enough about to put into the top 10 proper.

2015 Summer Movie Wager Scoring:

  • Getting number 1 or number 10 dead-on gets you 13 points (each).
  • The rest of the scoring goes like this:

  • 10 points for numbers 2-9 dead-on
  • 7 points if your pick was only one spot away from where it ended up
  • 5 points if it was two spots away
  • 3 points if your pick is anywhere in the Top 10
  • 1 point for each dark horse that makes it into the Top 10
  • The scoring is tabulated so that you get the SINGLE HIGHEST point value for each pick- that is, if you get number ten right, you don't get 13+3, you only get 13.

    Peter Sciretta's List:

  • Avengers: Age of Ultron
  • Minions
  • Jurassic World
  • Ant-Man
  • Ted 2
  • Tomorrowland
  • Inside Out
  • Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation
  • Mad Max: Fury Road
  • Pixels = July 24
  • Wildcards

  • Fantastic Four
  • San Andreas
  • Magic Mike XXL
  • David Chen's List

  • The Avengers: Age of Ultron
  • Inside Out
  • Minions
  • Ant-Man
  • Pixels
  • Mission Impossible Rogue Nation
  • Jurassic World
  • Ted 2
  • Tomorrowland
  • Mad Max: Fury Road
  • Wild Cards:
  • San Andreas
  • Fantastic Four
  • Terminator: Genisys
  • Germain Lussier's List:

    Avengers Age of Ultron
    Minions
    Jurassic World
    Inside out
    Mission Impossible 5
    Ant-Man
    Spy
    Pixels
    Ted 2
    Terminator Genisys

    Wildcards

  • Magic Mike XXL
  • Poltergeist
  • Pitch Perfect 2
  • Jeff Cannata's List:

    Avengers
    Minions
    Jurassic World
    Mission Impossible
    Inside Out
    Ted 2
    Magic Mike XXL
    Mad Max
    Ant Man
    Tomorrow Land

    Wildcards

  • Terminator
  • Pitch Perfect 2 Fantastic Four
  • Poltergeist
  • Feel free to make your own predictions in the comments below!