July 4 Weekend Estimates

Weekend Estimates July 4 Rank Movie TW % chg Total 1 Despicable Me 2 $1,090,000 +259.7% $1,393,000 2 Man of Steel $725,000 -64.8% $3,705,000 3 Blind Detective $630,000 +325.7% $778,000 4 World War Z $455,000 -49.4% $4,918,000 5 Midsummer Formula $164,000 -12.5% $530,000

The first weekend of July was a bummer for most films but Despicable Me 2 towered over Man of Steel to score its first ever #1 finish. The sequel has come a long way from its predecessor with Despicable Me opening to just $459,000 and 4th place in 2010 and ending with $1.488m. Nearly 3 years later, the 2nd in the series will have nearly made all of the first one's total in 1 weekend. Back to this weekend, Despicable Me 2 stood over the rest and kept increasing the gap between itself and other films over the weekend. Thursday saw it complete its opening day on top with $177,000 and over $50,000 ahead of any other film. Friday saw its lead increase slightly but for the day its gap shrunk to only $20,000. It ran away from the rest of the pack on the weekend, bolting to over $100,000 leads on Saturday and Sunday. This is all fine and dandy but Monsters University enters the ring next weekend and it is looking like it will crush everything in its path. WOM is decent but not exceptional. This will play a slight factor with regards to next weekend. Despicable Me 2 won't get a 2 multiplier so it will just have to pray and hope that Monsters University disappoints just a little bit so it can at least come close to making 2.5m. 2m looks likely even with Monsters University ready to pounce.

It wasn't pretty but Man of Steel claimed #2 even with a poor hold. Despite not having much competition, Man of Steel lost 65% of business from its already disappointing opening weekend. To have a smaller than expected opening weekend and then to follow it up with a bad hold speaks wonders. WOM is only OK but for a superhero movie, it is being shredded. Although this is doing fairly well in the rest of Asia, HK will be one of its lowest Asian territories. Even with half a year still to go, Man of Steel will go down as one of the biggest disappointments of 2013. For this weekend, it was battling for #2 with Blind Detective but eventually won due to higher ticket prices. Thursday put it $20,000 ahead of Blind Detective and it clawed back on Friday before giving way on Saturday and Sunday. With Monsters University raring to go, this looks like it will make just 4.3m total.

Blind Detective had huge hype going into this weekend with Andy Lau and Sammi Cheng being reunited for another film and it did fairly well. The "box office golden couple" brought in a lot of viewers and most were unconcerned about Andy Lau's recent box office failure Switch. After last weekend's average previews, this weekend it secured its 2nd place showing in admissions over Man of Steel by beating it on all 4 days, with its best days coming on Saturday and Sunday. The road ahead looks very tough for Blind Detective as Monsters University is unveiled on Thursday and then a slew of Hollywood films looks ready to take its screens away afterward. It will make 1m but it does not look like it can make much more than that. It might have to settle for 1.2m total.

World War Z was ushered out of the top 3 but remained a powerful force at the box office. It buried an estimated $455,000 in its 3rd weekend and has accumulated more than 4.9m. It gained bigger screens this weekend over Man of Steel at a handful of locations and has already become Brad Pitt's biggest hit. 5m is just around the corner and it will end the year inside the top 10. Incredible run for the zombie apocalypse film. It will finish with about 5.3-5.4m.

Midsummer Formula just nudged out Epic for the 5th spot. It held ball with the first 3 days of the weekend before Epic zoomed up on Sunday but it was enough to hold off Epic and spend a 2nd weekend inside the top 5. The film has not been well received as it is struggling with very low increases this weekend and has been burdened with being the worst rated film of the top 10. It does not look like it will get to $700,000 now with these soft increases.

Epic continued on its journey this week but Despicable Me 2 put a stop to its late buzz and quashed its dreams of 1m. It made an estimated $160,000, down 57%, for a total of $773,000. Monsters University should flatten its chances of seeing 1m and it might have to disembark with $950,000.

Now You See Me was not far behind and took in $158,000 (-37%) this weekend for a grand total of $3.303m.