Originally Posted By thenurmis "WDFA was the best game in town but hard cold cash saw the initial defectors cross the freeway to Glendale and DreamWorks." That seems to be a constant theme of Disney. from the days of old they have lost good talent, due to small pay checks
Originally Posted By FoxHound Well, the movie has been #1 two weeks in a row now----not too shabby for a movie about talking cars that so many people predicted would fail. Disney may be prepping the Pirates to be the boys' version of the princesses, but the Cars will be the real winners. My 3 year old nephew is obsessed with "Cars" (it is also the first movie he's seen at the theater). He's also into Thomas the Train and has (or wants) every Thomas toy you could think of. Now of course, he wants all the "Cars" cars. People should not dismiss this---the "Cars" as a franchise will no doubt be bigger than the movie. This is the first movie in a long time where there has been such a huge demand for tie-in toys. The Cars die-cast toys have sold out at Wal-Mart, Target, and Toys R Us locations in my area, something that did not happen for Nemo or The Incredibles.
Originally Posted By TALL Disney Guy I understand where Kar2oonMan is coming from. I heard "Cars" was #1 *again* this past weekend---the second in a row---and that excites me to see it even more. I came into this thread again thinking "Oh boy, I bet there's lots of talk about how great it's doing---2 weeks in a row at *#* *1!*"---yet some people's glasses are half-empty. Interesting...
Originally Posted By seanyoda The actuals are in... Friday: $9,205,816 Saturday: $12,914,955 Sunday: $11,610,863 (orginal estimate was $9 million) Weekend total: $33,731,634 Domestic take so far: $117,055,283
Originally Posted By DlandDug >>I'm sure Cars will ultimately be profitable once you factor in everything but it has underperformed. Perhaps by up to 50% so far.<< Are you seriously suggesting that "Cars" is supposed to be at $234 million right now??? At Disneyland today I was struck by how many little boys were wearing "Cars" apparel. Clearly, it's resonating. (P.S. There is no such thing as a "non-Lassiter" Pixar film. And you know what I mean.)
Originally Posted By DlandDug >><<But people in this thread were already convinced it wouldn't be #1 on Friday. >> I must have missed that post as I don't recall any LP-er suggesting that.<< Post #54: >>Well Friday numbers are in and it's very bad news for Cars. Cars made $9 million dollars which represents a large 54% drop from last week's Friday. In fact, Cars may not be #1 this weekend as Nacho Libre brought in $11 million.<< (P.S. Nacho Libre is a terrible film. Cars is a good film. Nu?)
Originally Posted By poohbear14 The Cars tie-in at McDonald's is doing very well. The toys are selling out.
Originally Posted By Spirit of 74 It amazes me that people can say anything about this film other than it is a hit. Period. Cars will be a huge money-maker for Disney in various forms for many years. You can, and Hollywood studios do, make numbers mean whatever you want them to. I remember when Forrest Gump was making hundreds of millions for Paramount hearing execs say it wasn't going to bring in one dollar of profit. Pure BS. As to Cars itself, I found it to be a charming, fun little movie. I loved the animation and the whole Route 66 lore has always fascinated me, even though NASCAR does the opposite. I also found the movie had plenty of heart. Did it touch me the way Bambi did or Peter Pan did or Beauty and the Beast or Lion King did? No. Most of Pixar's films don't resonate with me on such an emotional level. Only Toy Story 2 and possibly Monsters Inc had any emotional impact that equated with the Disney classics. But you don't need to get choked up or teary-eyed for an animated film to be high quality either. Just look at the Shrek franchise.
Originally Posted By wahooskipper If Bambi touched me I might have to slap him...and don't get me started about Peter Pan. The movie will do fine. No, it isn't Nemo or Toy Story or even Monster's Inc but if it is the movie that was eventually going to miss, then I'm not too upset about the miss. My kid isn't talking about it the way he talks about Toy Story or Nemo to this day but many kids are.
Originally Posted By Dlmusic <<In fact, Cars may not be #1 this weekend as Nacho Libre brought in $11 million>> I did post that, and it was a realistic projection. I did not say I was convinced that Cars would not be #1, I just said it might not be. Actually Cars had an amazingly good Sunday, and a fantastic Monday so it might be stabilizing. Trust me, I'm not gloom and doom about Cars. I think the movie has done quite well and still has a great chance at finishing over $220 million. This makes Pixar the first company to have 5 $200+ million movies in a row. If that's disappointing for Disney (or anyone else), then I'm afraid they need more realistic box office expectations.
Originally Posted By Dlmusic >>(P.S. Nacho Libre is a terrible film. Cars is a good film.>> Well don't worry, what with the Adam Sandler film coming out and most of the Napoleon Dynamite fanboys seeing Nacho it's first weekend, I'm not anticipating Nacho to develop much legs.
Originally Posted By vbdad55 I can't believe all the discussion of this as a miss .....someone please tell me what has done better this year ? The movie market is not what it was last year either-- and $110 million in 10 days is pretty darn good. Maybe, just maybe the economy having an impact on the movie market -- there have been a few good filsm this year that have not done anywhere near what was expected. Cars may be slightly limited in that the thought is that it will appeal more to boys than girls. But whose thought is this...the kids or their parents ? My daughters loved it and neither is a car fan...so to speak. Some movie critics have been waiting for so long to jump on PIXAR they are drooling right now....reminder many tried to do the same thing to Nemo when it opened...upset with the fact that with most of it filmed underwater it just couldn't be good. Beware: these same critics will be there looking to trash Pirates 2 -- much like they did with one initially until the $$ started flowing and some 'revised' their opinions. The true test of this film with be how it holds up ...... After ten days, Cars is running 18% behind the pace of Nemo and Incredibles -- how far behind is the movie industry box office from 2003 and 2004 ?
Originally Posted By leemac <<how far behind is the movie industry box office from 2003 and 2004 ?>> The BO is actually up on all of the past five years except for '04 so that isn't a good argument (albeit without considering inflation of ticket prices).
Originally Posted By trekkeruss FWIW, Box Office Mojo is now reporting Cars at $121mil as of Monday, moving past it's claimed production cost of $120mil. <a href="http://www.boxofficemojo.com/showdowns/chart/?view=daily&id=vs-pixar.htm" target="_blank">http://www.boxofficemojo.com/s howdowns/chart/?view=daily&id=vs-pixar.htm</a>
Originally Posted By vbdad55 Box Office up 3% YTY yet untold numbers of stories on the news about how bad it is ? Somewhere something doesn't seem to fit.
Originally Posted By cheesybaby <<Box Office up 3% YTY yet untold numbers of stories on the news about how bad it is ? Somewhere something doesn't seem to fit.>> Up 3% from 2005 is nothing to brag about. In terms of movie tickets sold domestically, 2005 was the worst year for the movies since 1996. That's right: number of movie tickets sold goes UP every year, except in 2005 when it plummeted back to 1996 levels. 2005 was a very, very bad year for the theatrical movie business. Up 3% from that is still very, very bad.
Originally Posted By TALL Disney Guy <The BO is actually up on all of the past five years> Hooray for body odor!
