Breaking Even in Film: More movies cross the line!

Get him to the Greek
Production Budget: $40 Million
Domestic Gross: $60 million
Overseas: $21 million
Worldwide: $81 million

Get him to the Greek was a decidedly middling comedy, especially when you consider it's from heavyweight Judd Apatow. Still, it managed to make its money back, and it has more coming in overseas.

Predators
Production Budget: $40 million
Domestic Gross: $44 million
Overseas: $37 million
Worldwide: $81 million

After 14 days in theaters, Predators has crossed the mark to make its money back. Despite a very steep drop last weekend, I think Predators still has some legs left, especially overseas. Look for a sequel to be announced any minute now.

Despicable Me
Production Budget: $69 million
Domestic Gross: $138 million
Overseas: $12 million
Worldwide: $150 million

Despicable Me managed to defy predictions earlier this month and is holding onto its glory. It's made its money back, even before you take overseas numbers into account and could be considered the breakout hit of the summer. Obviously it's just getting started overseas, so by the end of its run I wouldn't put $400 million worldwide out of its reach. I'm still surprised they made this film for under $70 million, but boy is Universal happy with this!

Universal will Survive

Despicable Me went far and above my expectations this weekend, earning over $60 million. This is especially impressive since it only cost $69 million to produce. I don't see why so much money is spent on animated films, this doesn't look much cheaper than the other animated features this year, which were all more than twice that much to produce. The real news here though, is this is the first time a Universal picture has been #1 since "Couple's Retreat" last October. That's a long dry spell. It's also Universal's biggest opening since "Fast and Furious" last April. Fast and Furious was the highest grossing film of the year for Universal, but it ranked #17 on the overall chart. It's no secret that the studio has been in trouble as of late, their last picture to make over $200 million was "The Bourne Ultimatum" in 2007. In that time, WB has had seven pictures to cross that mark. Fox has had 3, Sony managed 1, Disney afforded 5, and Paramount has had a shocking eight. Despicable Me could conceivably cross $200, but it's certainly not money in the bank. Still, this is good news for a studio with only one profitable film this summer, Get him to the Greek.

Bogus Box-Office Bumblings

So far this summer the money aspect of film has been...disappointing.

Iron Man 2 shattered no records.
Robin Hood didn't have any heroics.
Shrek 4 dropped steeply from the last film.
And now, Sex in the City 2 and Prince of Persia both underperformed.

What's in store for June? Can the picture business bounce back? Let's take a look.

June 4

Marmaduke
Predicted Opening Weekend: $20-$30 mil.
Predicted Total Gross: $80-$90 mil.

It looks awful, but this sort of thing has done well lately. Alvin & the Chipmunks, G-Force and Beverly Hills Chihuaha are recent examples of this. Moving on.

Killers
Predicted Opening Weekend: $20-$25 mil
Predicted Total Gross: $60-75 mil

This could suffer, due to the recent Bounty Hunter which is in similar territory, as well as the later-in-the-month appearance of Knight & Day. It will probably find modest success, with breakout potential for much more, largely based on Ashton Kutcher's bankabillity with the younger crowd.

Get him to the Greek
Predicted Opening Weekend: $20-$25 mil
Predicted Total Gross: $70-$90 mil

Judd Apatow is an interesting animal from a box office perspective. He's topped $100 million a few times, but most of his stuff is more mid-range, and he had 1 bomb (Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story). This will probably do fairly well.

Splice
Predicted Opening Weekend: $12-$14 mil
Predicted Total Gross: $35-$40 mil

Foreign Horror does better with critics than American stuff, but audiences and critics rarely line-up. I'm predicting solid returns, but on such a busy weekend, something's gotta bomb, and it may well be Splice.

Note: As stated earlier, something's gotta bomb. I predict that at least one of my predictions is vastly overstating actual business, and something will be a surprise failure on this weekend.

Come back next week for more.