Movie Revenue | Film Earnings | Box Office numbers matter

For the third week in a row, James Cameron’s 3D movie extravaganza – Avatar – takes the number one spot at the box office. With $68.3 million in New Years weekend sales, the science fiction masterpiece breaks the bank with a running total of over $1,000,000,000 in Gross! That is a lot of scratch, and a real vindication for both the studio and director, both of whom weathered the storm of critics questioning whether a $500 million budget was rational.

James Cameron's lead character Sully

Nothing is rational about the movie itself, and that seems to be what the audience enjoys about Avatar and its other-worldly sets. With all of the stress people cope with throughout the holidays, it is a treat to take a few hour break and be transported to another place and time such as with this instant classic movie.

James Cameron’s blockbuster movie ‘Avatar’ needs to be seen in IMAX 3D in order to not leave anything on the table as far as movie-making magic goes.

Certainly one could say that this movie is based partly on science, and partly on art. My first impression of the movie was that James Cameron basically had an orgasm on film — not literally of course. Every minute detail of the imagery is controlled to create the kind of total fantasy world that took me away for the duration of the movie.

My one headscratcher during the movie is that there is a particular flying critter, the largest in the land, that appears made of silk materials. Perhaps it was intentional to distinguish the role the critter would later play in the climax of the movie? It just seemed a little less natural of a skin than the other creatures brought to life from Cameron’s imagination.

The story is just ok enough to not matter too much as compared to the staggering shock and awe of the visuals. The plot is somewhat tried and true and I cannot blame the studio and James Cameron for playing it safe, since the special effects are such a monumental leap forward for Hollywood.

Go see Avatar in IMAX 3D to see the whole movie. Without the 3D, some of the grandeur of the movie is not present.

Mazel Tov to New Moon, which is the first movie in a while to win the box office two weeks in a row — something Jim Carry could not do with A Christmas Carol. Surprising box office results were on tap for Sandra Bullock in The Blind Side. The Blind Side’s total movie revenue exceeded $100 million, in part thanks to a monster turkey day turnout.

With $42.5 million in U.S. movie revenue this weekend, New Moon pushed up its total to $230.7 million. That is still only half of the investment thus in far into James Cameron’s ‘Avatar’. Cameron’s long time vision of never seen before characters are getting the film viewing marketplace primed – but will Avatar live up to the hype?

Twilight 'New Moon'

This week’s box office seemed to be in the bag for Twilight New Moon from early on. With a record-breaking single day sales on Friday & record-breaking midnight sales for its opening — Summit Entertainment banked $140.7 million. One record that did not get shattered was the opening weekend sales, as Kristen Stewart, Robert Pattinson and Taylor Lautner propelled the movie to third place all-time.

Sandra Bullock was probably not mad at her fans for helping The Blind Side finish second for the week with $34.5 million in movie revenue in its debut.

Twilight New Moon beat out all other movies for midnight ticket sales, according to Summit Entertainment. Estimates for Friday night’s ticket sales put New Moon ahead of The Dark Knight’s one day movie revenue of $62.7 million. Apparently the blitz of publicity hyping New Moon is paying off, and the trend of foreign box office glory is also rumored to be happening. The world flocked to see This Is It, which resulted in massive payoffs for Sony.

Sandra Bullock is competing with 2012 for second place. We’ll keep you posted!

Update: $72.7 million opening day record!