For my American readers I hope you had an incredible Labor Day Weekend. For my readers in Europe, I hope you had a wonderful weekend as well. Now that we are in the first week of September, summer is officially over. Lets all take a deep breath to process that set of information. I could go into detail about my love for the changing leaves, pumpkin spice lattes and apple cider but this is not the time for that. Instead I am going to give a rundown of what was hot and what flopped at the box office this summer.
In my Summer Movie Preview post, I predicted that three biggest films of the summer would be The Avengers, The Dark Knight Rises and The Amazing Spider-man. I must have been looking into the crystal ball because I was right on target with that one. I admit that it would not take a genius to figure that information out. The success of the first blockbuster of the summer The Avengers was surreal. I was excited about the film but I did not think it would draw the crowds it did. The upcoming sequels in the Marvel franchise will get a huge boost from the success of The Avengers. In the wake of the success of The Avengers, many films failed to deliver huge audience turnout (specifically Battleship and Dark Shadows). Not until The Dark Knight Rises did we have our second bona fide blockbuster. What I did not see in my crystal ball was the runaway hit that Ted was. It was the fifth biggest hit of the summer. I believe that it found success because moviegoers were looking for a good laugh this summer. I admit when Ted came to life I was in complete ROFL mode.
Animated films continue to dominate at the box office. The biggest animated hit was Brave which was followed by Madagascar 3: Europe's Most Wanted. Madagascar did something that is rare, it grossed more money than it predecessors. It can be debated that Ice Age: Continental Drift was a disappoint because it was the lowest grossing film in the franchise. However, Ice Age was on the biggest films overseas. It will also do really well on DVD and Blu-Ray. Several independent films saw success at the box office this summer as well. There was The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel(BEMH), Moonrise Kingdom, Beasts of the Southern Wild and The Intouchables to name a few. I still have not seen Beasts and BEMH but they are still high on my list. It warms my heart when independent films do well at the box office.
It seemed that the reboots were a hit and miss this summer. The Amazing Spider-man did do well but it still was not in the league of the Sam Raimi vehicle. The Bourne Legacy was off to a good start but I don't see this reboot going any further. In the long run it lacked the legs that the previous films had. Then there were those reboots like the Total Recall that completely crashed and burned at the box office. Besides reboots it seems that ensemble pieces were having a hard time finding an audience. Rock of Ages and What to Expect When You're Expecting were pretty much duds at the box office. Even The Expendables 2 did not live up to the hype. Studios have to remember that the movie has got to be good. If you throw eye candy at us it won't distract us from a bad story unless the movie is Magic Mike. Just kidding Magic Mike was not a bad film but it was an ensemble film done right.
Will Smith proved that he still a movie star. I know you could argue that MIB 3 under-performed at the American Box Office but not only was the film the seventh highest grossing film of the summer but out-grossed it predecessors at the international box office. Scandal aside Snow White and The Huntsman proved that audiences loved the idea of darker take on the fairy tale. Charlize Theron had another hit with Prometheus.
It would have been interesting to see how the GI Joe sequel would have done this summer but its release date was pushed to next year. Since 2012 is the year of Channing Tatum, I am pretty certain the movie would have been another success story for him. Now we will have to see how 10 Years does well this fall.
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