Early word is that Spider-Man 3 is on track to even beat Spider-Man 1‘s $114.8 record setting opening weekend box office. Af of late afternoon, the film is on track to take in around $50 million on Friday alone. As we reported earlier, over 300 of the 1,000 midnight screenings on the film were completely sold out on Thursday night. Industry analysts have been predicting an opening weekend gross somewhere between $120 and $140 million. So as of Friday afternoon, the film is on track to meet expectations. Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest holds the record for biggest opening weekend of all time, with $135.6 million. As of right now, it does not appear that Spider-Man 3 will beat that number (but let me remind you, nobody expected it to).
Spider-Man 1′s final domestic take was $403.7 million ($821.7 worldwide) and Spider-Man 2 ended with around $373.5 million ($783.8 worldwide). If this was any other summer or release date, I would now predict that the film would go on to make $450 domestically, and $900 internationally. However, some analysts think that Spidey could dip in the following weeks due to the intense threequel competition.
We’ll report back later tonight or early tomorrow morning with more accurate Friday numbers.
.
Please Recommend /Film on Facebook
Update: More than 300 of the approximate 1,000 Thursday midnight Spider-Man 3 show times on Fandango were sold out online.
As of 10:00am on Thursday morning, more than one hundred midnight shows for Spider-Man 3 have already SOLD OUT, according to the popular online movie ticket website Fandango.com. On top of that, many theaters (including IMAX screens) have decided to add 3:00am screenings to appease fans that need their Spidy fix. As of this morning, Spider-Man 3 has accounted for 95% of Fandango’s weekly ticket sales.
The Users of BoxOfficeMojo are predicting that the film will make #133.2 million in it’s first weekend. That number is only a few million shy of Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest’s record of $135.6 million.
Meanwhile, BoxOfficeGuru is predicting that the film will make “into the friendly neighborhood of $140M over the Friday-to-Sunday span this weekend.”
Spider-Man 3 is already on a monster roll, setting a bunch of overseas records in it’s first day of pre-release (note: the film will be released on Friday in the States). The film took in over $29.2 million on May 1 from it’s one day debut in just 16 overseas markets. According to THR, the film topped Spider-Man 2′s bow in the same territories by 86% ($15.6 million) and that of the original by 175% ($10.6 million).” But the biggest statistic is next:
10 of the 16 openings had the biggest opening day of all time. WOW. That’s a huge feat.
Read More »
Spider-Man 3 hits theaters this Friday Thursday night. Sony has super-booked many theaters with 12:01 midnight screenings of the film (which will count to the Friday and weekend numbers). And we’re not talking one or two theaters, we’re talking 6 to 9 in some bigger market multiplexes. The studio is trying to stack the deck to ensure a $100-plus opening weekend. The first film took in $114 million, and Spider-Man 2 made $88 million on the first weekend. Industry analysts predict that Spider-Man 3 will top $100 million, but will not exceed Spider-Man 1‘s numbers.
The film will be released in 4253 locations, including 53 IMAX locations. This is the widest movie opening of all time, at least for a couple weeks until Shrek the Third likely takes the title.
The Asian grosses for Spider-Man 3 are bigger than both of the previous films. The latest movie earned Â¥415 million ($3.47 million) in Japan in one day, beating Spider-Man 2′s $3.43 million and Spider-Man’s $2.9 million. The film also took in 3.2 billion won in Korea ($3.46 million), and $HK7.5 million in Hong Kong ($958,984), beating the previous record holder Kung Fu Hustle.
One thing is for sure, Spider-Man 3 might be the most expensive film of all time. Some estimates go as high as $500 million after press, prints and advertising. A distribution executive at a studio thinks that Spidey might open to a huge $120 million opening (as it is an event film). But will the movie have legs? With so many huge blockbuster movies/sequels/threequels opening this Summer, some are bound to fail.
“Shrek and Pirates have broad, broad appeal,” this executive says. “With Spider-Man, the word is out that it’s dark.
I’m not sure that he doesn’t have a point.
On a side note: Chris Thilk at Movie Marketing Madness has an incredible in-depth look at Sony’s marketing of the film. You have to check this out, it’s Chris’ most in depth article to date. It’s like 10 pages long, and well worth the read.
Before you see Spider-Man 3 this Friday, catch up on the comic history behind the movie. HeroHunt has compiled a list of important comic book moments that helped to inspire the third Spidey film. Sure, the continuity in some (probably most) cases has changed, but don’t let that stop you from knowing the geeky origins of all the characters and events in Spider-Man 3.
- First Appearance: Sandman – Amazing Spider-Man #4, Sep. 1963
- First Appearance: Gwen Stacy and Harry Osborn – Amazing Spider-Man #31, Dec. 1965
- Harry Osborn becomes The Green Goblin – Amazing Spider-Man #136, Sep. 1974
- The return of the burglar who killed Uncle Ben – Amazing Spider-Man #200, January 1980
- First Appearance: Spider-Man’s black costume – Amazing Spider-Man #252, May 1984
- Spidey’s black costume is revealed to be a symbiote – Amazing Spider-Man # 258, Nov. 1984
- First Appearance: Venom – Amazing Spider-Man #299, Apr. 1988 and Amazing Spider-Man #300, May 1988
Check out the full list of comic books at HeroHunt.
Spider-Man 3 is coming up. You’ve seen the trailers (there was like 20 of them, right?). You’ve seen the television spots. But have you seen all 60 plus photos posted below? We think not. Check out the photos (after the jump) and get excited. Spider-Man 3 hits theaters on May 4th 2007 in the States. We’ll be there, will you?
Read More »
“The three main recurring characters get stuck in a rut and the same can be said of the film itself in Spider-Man 3.”
A bad review from Variety is never a good thing, especially when the film in question is the big summer tent-pole. Todd McCarthy’s review takes aim at the film’s script, saying it resulted in “a story that would have provenmore satisfactory for a late ’60s cartoon-hero TV show than for a new-century blockbuster.” This is something I very much feared from some of the clips and trailers. The dialogue always appeared very stiff and badly written to me. But it’s not all bad. McCarthy praises Sandman as “a strange and visually interesting baddie endowed by Church with a melancholy undercurrent.” And at the end of the day, Variety is a trade paper which analyzes the industry. That said, McCarthy is quick to admit that the film’s “devaluation shouldn’t hurt at the box office.”
You can read the full review on Variety.com.
RADAR online is reporting that Spider-Man 3 is the most expensive movie of all time. The site/magazine claims that Sony has spent over $350 million on the film so far. You add Press and Advertising and that figure goes up to half a billion. But is it true?
The original number coming from the studio was $250 million. The producers of the film insist that the costs didn’t exceed $270 million. Studios and producers almost never tell the truth, but the $80 million gap is too large to be believed. Realistically, the studio probably spent about $280-something million on the film so far. You add the P&A, and that comes to around $400-$415 million, far below the number that Radar magazine is trying to spin. Either way, the truth is that this: Spider-Man 3 is probably the most expensive film of all time.
Back in January, we had an article on James Cameron’s Avatar, which is already set to become one of the most expensive films of all time. You might want to read that article to find out the truth about budget costs, and how much money is needed to break even. Did you even know: A movie’s distributor receives only a little more than half of the final gross. And I’m not talking before the stars salaries, special effects or P&A. I’m talking about those numbers you see every week on BoxOfficeMojo. If you didn’t, you should definitely read up.
