Friday Box Office Analysis
By Tim Briody
February 24, 2007
BoxOfficeProphets.com
The best of a fairly unimpressive group of openers this weekend is The Number 23 with $5.8 million. Absolutely savaged by critics (doing worse than The Abandoned, which didn't even make the top ten), this number can likely be attributed entirely to the presence of Jim Carrey. This number is only a few thousand behind Ghost Rider for the top spot on Friday, but I expect that gap to widen slightly when the full weekend estimates become available. Call it around $15.6 million for the weekend, and a quick drop from here on.
Reno 911!: Miami
The big screen adaptation of the Comedy Central Cops spoof opened with $4.1 million on Friday, pretty good for what it is. There hasn't been much in the way of sophomoric mindless comedy lately, so perhaps one could call the audience for Reno 911! underserved. Look for a weekend total of around $11 million, which can definitely be considered a win for Lt. Dangle and company.
Amazing Grace
Outperforming two other wider releases on just 791 theaters, Amazing Grace earns $1.4 million on Friday. The target audience should be able to keep that quite-good per screen average up for the entire weekend, giving it $4.6 million.
The Astronaut Farmer
The feel-good movie of the weekend doesn't feel very good right now as it places tenth with a mere $1.3 million on Friday. Of all the movies to be hurt by the Academy Awards on Sunday, it's this one as the audience who might go see it on Sunday evening will likely be home watching the Oscars on television instead. Still, I expect it to end up with just under $4 million for the weekend.
Notable Holdovers
The only thing really worth mentioning among last weekend's crop of openers is that Ghost Rider completely plummets 62% from last Friday, but remains on top of the box office, just ahead of The Number 23. It should still be there when we get the weekend estimates, with a second weekend take of $17.5 million.