In spite opening a little lower than Pixar predecessors, the Disney/Pixar story about a French rat that wants to be a chef brought in the 8th straight No. 1 animated opener for Pixar. The good news is these types of movies usually have a lot of staying power, and the movie should do well over a long period of time.
It finished with $47.2 million, opening at 3,940 venues. This is lower than expected as it was projected to open at anywhere between $50 to $65 million. The average Pixar film has historically opened between $60 to $70 million. With animated family films of this quality usually reaching the $250 million mark, even with a slower start, it still has a good chance of making it.
What could keep it from happening would be the strong films about to be released in July that could cut into its take. The two that could especially make a dent in it would be Transformers, which will be released on Tuesday and Harry Potter not long afterward.
In what was somewhat of a surprise to me, Live Free or Die Hard opened much stronger than I thought it would, or rather, I wasn't sure if it would have any legs or not after being on the sidelines for 12 years and Bruce Willis not getting any younger. That didn't stop fans from coming out and helping it to bring in almost $33.2 million for the weekend to give it the No. 2 spot.
While Evan Almighty didn't plunge like some of the summer's earlier films, it needed to hold a lot stronger to give it a chance to pay for itself domestically, unfortunately it wasn't able to come close as it dropped by 52 percent from last weekend, and was only able to garner $15.1 million in its second time around. It won't come close to paying for its $200 million budget in North America. International sales will have to come through for them if they want to come out in the black.
Top ten for the weekend:
| 1 | Ratatouille | $47,227,000 |
| 2 | Live Free or Die Hard | $33,150,000 |
| 3 | Evan Almighty | $15,089,000 |
| 4 | 1408 | $10,610,000 |
| 5 | Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer | $9,000,000 |
| 6 | Knocked Up | $7,418,000 |
| 7 | Ocean's Thirteen | $6,050,000 |
| 8 | Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End | $5,015,000 |
| 9 | Sicko | $4,500,000 |
| 10 | Evening | $3,513,000 |
Other Box Office Sites:
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I liked Live Free or Die Hard...Check out my review at Cold Leftovers.
As action movies go, it was pretty good, i think. Maybe not the best of the four, but worthy of the Die Hard name...
Posted by: David Lay | July 4, 2007 8:08 PM | Permalink to Comment