The summer movie season started to big numbers with the success of Iron Man 3 in the UK, US and across the globe.
The Great Gatsby opened on Friday in the US to mixed reviews but has surprised many by the strength of its opening taking about $20m on Friday. It won’t be enough to topple Iron Man 3 from top spot but opened with over $50m+ over its opening weekend. Which is a very impressive opening for a film like this. It was playing very stongly to women that have been starved of films aimed at them. In upcoming weeks films like Star Trek Into Darkness, The Hangover 3 and Fast & Furious 3 are all films aimed at men.
The film is playing very strongly to women and with many of the other films out in May targeting the male audience like Star Trek into Darkness, Fast & Furious 6 and The Hangover 3 Gatsby should hold up well against them.
On Wednesday The Great Gatsby opens the Cannes Film Festival it will be interesting to see the critical reaction internationally to the film as Moulin Rouge received much better response critically internationally than it did in the US. Moulin Rouge was more successful internationally than it was in the US.
When the film was delayed from its Christmas release the Cannes launch was obvious F. Scott Fitzgerald finished writing the book just a few miles away from Cannes & Baz Luhrmann made it an obvious choice for Cannes. The only problem in doing that is that you have to release the film during one of the busiest weeks of the year.
The film will receive huge international media coverage but it is opening a week after Star Trek into Darkness in the UK and the same day as Fast & Furious 6 it will also be the second weekend for Star Trek Into Darkness. All three would normally command the biggest screens.
The rebooted Star Trek opened with £6m 4 years ago Into Darkness opened with £8.9m over its opening 4 day weekend in the UK a 50% increase on 2009’s Star Trek.
Fast& Furious 5 opened with over £5m in 2011 Part 6 has its world premiere in the UK and the film was filmed in part in the UK so will likely open strongly.
It is very tough to estimate the opening for The Great Gatsby; Moulin Rouge opened with £2.4m 12 years ago with the media coverage that it will get opening Cannes on May 15th and being 3D it is likely to open with £5m+ but will that be more than Into Darkness’s 2nd weekend. Would an exhibitor be willing to switch Star Trek for The Great Gatsby or Fast & Furious 6 in its biggest screens?
The following weekend is equally tough with The Hangover 3 opening against Epic both likely to have £5m+ opening with Epic having 4 days of previews to inflate its box office.
With 5 major films being released over less than 3 weeks all fighting for the main screens and the public’s attention each opening on 500+ screens Star Trek, Fast & Furious 6 and The Hangover 3 are the three films that could cannibalize each other as they are all aimed at the same audience.
I hope Gatsby does well … I think it is something that people we see over and over again so that should help!