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W E D N E S D AY, J U N E 2 1 , 2 0 0 6How Is "Cars" Doing At The Box Office?The new Pixar movie "Cars" has grossed $117 million in ten days in theUS. (It will not open in most overseas territories for a few weeks.) But ithas been labeled a terrible disappointment for Disney since theybought out Pixar -- Disney stock has even taken a tumble because of it.They are wrong. Here are their arguments:1. It is a bust because the movie dropped more in the second week than"The Incredibles," "Finding Nemo," etc. -- Everyone knows aboutlooking for the second week drop -- that is, how much a movie fell fromthe opening weekend numbers. The reasoning? Opening weekend tellsyou how the marketing campaign and the star power worked. Weekendtwo tells you how the movie worked. It CAN be a useful stat, but peopleare blowing it all out of proportion. "Cars" dropped more than thoseearlier Pixar movies, but it had the LOWEST second week drop of anymajor release this summer -- and since comparing stats from even 5years ago can be misleading, "Cars" ability to open solid and drop lessthan any other movie this summer is a huge positive.2. "Cars" is a flop because it is grossing less than "The Incredibles,""Finding Nemo," etc. Again, here is another artificial comparison. Doanalysts really expect every single Pixar film to gross more than the lastone? In ten years, they would have to gross $600 mil to keep up thatstandard. Yes, Pixar has had an amazing run, but it is unrealistic -- tosay the least -- to expect every new release to keep setting records.Ultimately, the only standard that matters is this: how much did amovie cost to make and how much money did it take in? "Cars"probably cost around $120 mil. It will gross roughly $200 mil in the USand maybe another $200 mil overseas (though that could be less sinceNASCAR is not a draw around the world). Figure at LEAST $300 milworldwide for DVD and TV sales. That's a total of $700 mil, notcounting merchandising, which is reportedly going very strongly. Sounless you think every Pixar movie made should be a record-breaker,"Cars" is fine. It didn't get the usual glowing reviews of Pixar movies(I'd only give it three stars out of four) and it fell below "expectations"of $250 mil, but "expecting" a movie to break records or creating theartificial standard of second weekend drops is beside the point. "Cars"Next Blog»sal1mineo@hotmail.comSEARCH BLOG FLAG BLOGFOLLOW BLOGP O P S U R F I N G . C O MS U R F I N G T H E WAV E S O F P O P U L A R C U LT U R EB Y M I C H A E L G I LT Z & F R I E N D SPOPSURFING.COM: How Is "Cars" Doing At The Box Office?http://popsurfing.blogspot.com/2006/06/how-is-cars-doing-at-b...
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POPSURFING.COM: How Is "Cars" Doing At The Box Office?http://popsurfing.blogspot.com/2006/06/how-is-cars-doing-at-b...
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