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Kim Hollis: Wes Anderson's The Grand Budapest Hotel jumped into the top ten this weekend despite being in only 66 venues, with a total of $3.6 million. What do you think is the future for this release?

Edwin Davies: I'm envisioning a similar run to Moonrise Kingdom, which also broke the record for best live-action theater averages in limited release, before slowly expanding out, eventually ending with a very respectable $45.5 million. I think that Grand Budapest Hotel might do better than Moonrise Kingdom, though, both because it's already outperforming it (admittedly with a slightly more aggressive release) and because it's being pitched as an accessible, wacky comedy. More importantly, Grand Budapest Hotel has the goodwill generated by Moonrise Kingdom on its side, and although it's not a sequel, Anderson's films are so distinctly his that each film feels like a follow-up, and he's a franchise unto himself at this point (let's call this The Pixar Effect). I don't see it becoming a blockbuster, but I wouldn't be surprised if it overtook The Royal Tenenbaums to become Anderson's most successful film.

As an addendum: I'm interested in seeing how the film does internationally. Anderson's films have consistently done better in the US than in the rest of the world, with only Fantastic Mr. Fox grossing more than $25 million overseas. Grand Budapest Hotel has already grossed $20 million from foreign ticket sales after just a few weeks, and is doing especially well in the UK. At this point, it's pretty much guaranteed to be his biggest worldwide hit, which is an interesting development for a director whose work seemed to have hit a consistent level and never really exceeded it.

David Mumpower: I am actually not as sold on the movie as some of you for the reason Edwin noted as a positive. It has been platformed at an aggressive pace. The flip side of that is that a month from now, it will be fading quicker than his previous titles.

Matthew Huntley: Overall, I foresee an eventual $50-60 million box-office take for Grand Budapest Hotel, which, as Edwin said, is far from blockbuster status, but given the niche audience that Wes Anderson caters to, it's still a great result. His films always start fast like this before eventually tapering off (the art-house crowd tends to make them very front-loaded but they're never quite able to connect with mainstream audiences). However, I could see Hotel, given its current hype and ensemble cast, continuing to break this trend. I don't think we're too far off from a Wes Anderson film opening at saturation level because, soon enough, his audience will be that much bigger and the film won't depend on word-of-mouth before rolling out to additional venues.

Felix Quinonez: I think this one will be one of the "stronger" Wes Anderson movies. But even though I think it looks great I still find it hard to believe that this has any chance to attract any new blood to the Anderson cult. It will however please the already converted. I see it matching or slightly surpassing Moonrise Kingdom to become his second "most popular" movie.

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