Movie Master

In the first week of May, 2004, the summer season kicked off one month ahead of schedule, and "The Day After Tomorrow" debuted with an astonishing box office figure of 84 million in its premiere weekend, successfully launching the first shot of the new summer season. It was a huge surprise for everyone.

However, "The Day After Tomorrow" will face the fierce impact of "Troy". When everyone starts to discuss, the box office data of "The Day After Tomorrow" next week can be controlled within 60%, or even 55%. In order to ensure the outstanding results of the follow-up box office, "The Day After Tomorrow" handed over an astonishing drop of 43%, which made the American media collectively take a breath and then fell silent.

The so-called box office decline, as the name suggests, is the extent of the box office decline. In other words, it is actually the endurance of the movie's subsequent box office. Generally speaking, the lower the box office decline in the second week and the third week, it means that the final cumulative box office of the movie can reach the higher limit.

The box office declines of different types of movies are different. For example, horror movies generally have a box office drop of more than 60% in the next week. Works with excellent word-of-mouth will definitely decline even more in the next week.

There are many factors that affect the box office decline, such as premiere data, such as schedule issues, such as competing works in the same period, such as word of mouth, such as publicity strategies or news events, such as the scale of expanded and reduced screenings, and so on. Of course, what I’m talking about here are movies that are released on a large scale, not the one-screened works like "City of God". From the one-screened to the expanded ones, the box office trend curve is another look.

However, generally speaking, for works with a premiere box office of more than 80 million yuan, the decline in the next week can be controlled within 60%, which is an acceptable result; and generally speaking, the box office decline of commercial films is controlled within 100%. About 40% is considered very good; if the next week's decline can be controlled to less than 30%, or even 20%, this is extremely rare for any work.

Studios can breathe a sigh of relief when something like "The Day After Tomorrow" or "Troy" falls below 55 percent the next week. However, the result made everyone exclaim: "The Day After Tomorrow" handed over 47.9 million weekend box office data for the next week with only a 43% drop. There was an uproar.

What's even more frightening is that "the day after tomorrow" has created such a success by stepping on the shoulders of "Troy". Such a pattern really made a group of experts exclaim "incomprehensible".

Under the eyes and expectations of the public, the debut "Troy" suffered a tragic defeat. It only harvested 47 million opening weekend data, not only ushered in an avalanche defeat, but also lost The summer weekend champion, witnessed "the day after tomorrow" achieve consecutive championships. The difference of only 900,000 US dollars is so weak that it seems that only a small step can be crossed, but it has caused a world of difference, a champion, a runner-up, a heaven, and a hell.

In the second week of May 2004, "The Day After Tomorrow" topped the weekend box office charts in North America!

Just one day ago, after witnessing the box office on Friday and Saturday, if someone said that "The Day After Tomorrow" would overwhelm "Troy" to achieve the consecutive box office championship, everyone would probably cast their eyes on "crazy". Even Warner Bros., when the box office on Friday and Saturday is far below expectations, will never believe that the champion will fall; even Twentieth Century Fox itself, on the premise that the box office performance in the next week is much higher than expected. Next, I will not wishful thinking that I can complete the reelection...

A skinny camel is bigger than a horse. In any case, the strong momentum of "Troy" is still enough to ensure the championship of the week. It is more touching and looks more decent. As for the quality of the box office data, it is a problem that Warner Bros. itself needs to worry about.

Top media including "Los Angeles Times" and "New York Times" are ready to report. News headlines such as "Finished at the box office, but still won the championship", "Aspired to win the North American championship with ultra-low weekend box office data", "Far below expectations, barely won the championship in a bloody battle" and other news headlines have already been drawn up.

But now, the overall plan has been disrupted, and the major media have no choice but to change their reports in the midst of exclamations and confusion.

"'The Day After Tomorrow' showed an astonishing drop in the box office and achieved an incredible consecutive championship!"

"The appearance of the dark horse was black to the end, and the day after tomorrow defeated "Troy" and successfully defended the title!"

"'Troy' fell into the abyss of word-of-mouth, the box office was in a slump, and it lost the weekend box office champion."

"'The Day After Tomorrow' completed the impossible task, and achieved two consecutive championships without any dispute with his wonderful performance in the second week."

"Lancelot-Strello-style miracle again, the doomsday storm overturned the Trojan horse led by Brad Pitt."

"The battle for the box office in the second week of May, 'The Day After Tomorrow' reached the top in blood, and 'Troy' fell sadly."

"Unbelievable box office success, 'The Day After Tomorrow' once again exceeded expectations, showing the king's demeanor."

"Achilles' heel, Brad's box office appeal has been questioned again! 'The Day After Tomorrow' completes the Jedi counterattack!"

"When the bayonet sees red, fight with the body: 'The day after tomorrow' is slightly better."

...

The headlines on the front pages of all the media are amazed. In the past two weeks, the box office duel between "The Day After Tomorrow" and "Troy" has attracted so much attention, and the shock at this moment is so turbulent; No matter how sensational the screening ceremony was, how amazed is the surprise at this moment; how strong is the confidence of the "Troy" crew, how firm is the support of professional filmmakers, and how violent is the reversal at this moment; how huge is the "Troy" publicity , How solemn the global simultaneous premiere ceremony is, how profound the shame at this moment is.

People can't even tell whether the catastrophic defeat of "Troy" is more eye-catching, or the overturned victory of "The Day After Tomorrow" is more controversial; The strong momentum of "The Day After Tomorrow" moving forward amidst the controversy is even more incredible; it is more worthy of sympathy for "Troy" to lose face and face, or "The Day After Tomorrow" to win the audience and win the box office is more worthy of discussion.

Ironically, the debut of "The Day After Tomorrow" was once considered as cannon fodder for the warm-up.

When the major Hollywood film companies were discussing the opening film in the first week of May, almost everyone avoided it, because everyone hoped to compete for the schedule of the second week of May-after the warm-up of the first week, The frenzy of movie viewing in the second week will attract everyone's attention.

"Troy" and "Shrek 2" are strong contenders for the second week. Finally, "Troy" was released in the second week of May, and "Shrek 2" was released in the third week. From this detail, we can see that Not only Warner Bros., but also other major film companies including DreamWorks have pinned their hopes on "Troy", and even think that this work has more market appeal than the sequel of "Shrek 2". Power -- Brad Pitt, Wolfgang Petersen and Orlando Bloom are more than one plus one plus one.

Relatively speaking, the declining 20th Century Fox was pushed to the first week of May to act as cannon fodder. The major film companies even sympathized with the embarrassing status of "the day after tomorrow" and generously gave up media resources to work together for this film. The film was promoted, and many people even took the initiative to appear at the premiere to jointly create momentum. The "compensation psychology of guilt" is really obvious. Twentieth Century Fox had a broken tooth and could only swallow it.

However, only two weeks later, the invincible "Troy" lowered his proud head, hid in a dark corner in embarrassment, sucked his wounds, and witnessed the complete victory of "the day after tomorrow" with scars. This is simply... This is simply the loudest slap in the face of Hollywood. Even the miracle of "Rocky" is not enough to describe this shocking reversal.

Even Paramount Pictures was caught off guard. The happiness came too far to react at all—after winning the championship for two consecutive weeks, the cumulative box office of "The Day After Tomorrow" has reached 170 million. It marks that the film not only easily crossed the 130 million cost line, but even broke through the 150 million threshold in one fell swoop. The 200 million is already a sure thing, and even began to spy on the 300 million natural moat!

This is only Lance's second work. "City of God" won three Oscar statuettes, and "The Day After Tomorrow" swept $170 million in two weeks. It is a miracle and a one-man show of a genius. In one fell swoop, Lance has become the hottest new director in the Hollywood industry.

A newcomer means a cheap price, a negotiating advantage, and unlimited potential... If this newcomer comes from Sundance, has won awards and box office recognition, then it is simply one in ten thousand!

There is always such a joke in Hollywood that when a director hands over a work with a box office of 300 million, he can become the darling of the eight major film companies. Of course, this is just a joke, but it is undeniable that the director's box office ability has become a magic weapon that every film company dreams of.

But now, Lance's next work has been awarded to Paramount, which also makes Paramount the envy of everyone. At this moment, Brad Gray suddenly remembered: They haven't signed the contract yet, and things haven't been confirmed in black and white! Suddenly, there was chaos inside Paramount.

Compared with the madness of 20th Century Fox, Paramount's joy is really insignificant. Mark Gordon not only witnessed the miracle of the premiere of "The Day After Tomorrow", but also witnessed the madness of "The Day After Tomorrow" in the second week. This summer has been fantastic for 20th Century Fox!