Figured I'd finally start this thread to have a look back at the box office earnings of a decade ago - especially considering that we have a few folks here who were posting about these numbers when they were first reported. I'll keep updating this first post each week.

I remember being really, really surprised at the time that Elf beat Master & Commander and rose to #1. Even though there was some precedent with The Santa Clause 2's crazy-good hold from the previous year (although that one probably got a fair amount of help from sneak-in business for 8 Mile), a 15% drop was out of this world. It was undoubtedly the clearest sign at that point that the film was really catching on as a future seasonal staple.

Master & Commander did decently, but $25.1 million wasn't the most immediately encouraging start for a movie with such a hefty price tag. With the Oscar nominations it got, I'm still surprised that it didn't top $100 million.

The Matrix Revolutions got pummeled after that opening weekend, but... duh. Even as a huge Matrix fan who was really looking forward to seeing the movie at the time (I eventually did over Thanksgiving weekend), I knew that the reception it was getting wasn't great. It's funny to look back on just what an enormous hit the Matrix's stock took within the course of a single year. It went from Reloaded's gargantuan opening in May to Revolutions's quick crumble in November. Even after 10 years of inflation, it still doesn't adjust over $200 million total.

I loved to follow box office back then.

Fun thread.

And yes this makes me feel old as hell because I was posting on BOM about these.

10 years isn't that old.

elf's success didn't surprise me. Ferrell stole the show in Old School earlier in the year & the market was primed for holiday comedy.

matrix & master n commander tanking = much more surprising

Master & Commander didn't tank at all. It was deemed as a respectable gross. Unlike you, Excel, I was posting back then and I remember it. Look at its adjusted gross now and you can see that it was solid.

The Matrix Revolutions also didn't tank, and it wasn't surprising at all where it finished. Elf, on the other hand, was a little bit of a surprise to people in 2003.

Excel was there 10 years ago. To be fair Algren, you never made post that wasn't Stallone related back then. I remember our thread on why D-Tox (Eye See You) wasn't released theatrically. Would have at least made 40 million with decent marketing. It was so bizarre seeing him drop off so badly. He honestly went from highest paid actor in cinema (25 a film) to DTV in 3 movies. But when you see Get Carter, Driven, and Avenging Angelo, you do understand. But even so, actors of Stallone's caliber are given so many more chances today.

I was so proud, I remember I made the sub 140 million gross prediction for Revolutions. Everyone thought I was crazy. Most though Revolutions was going to at least make 185 million, and 220 was the average prediction. But it followed the Hannibal-Red Dragon/ Back to the Future Part II to Part III drop off to a tee.

M&C didn't really disappoint? It was Crowe's followup to BM and Gladiator, and they were both so cheap by comparison that it not making 100 million on it's 150 million budget was weak. It didn't break even overseas either. Then snubbed by te oscars. Luckily it made decent money on DVD.

Fun thread. I didn't post back then but it is still great to know something from the past.

Yeah Elf was the highlight of the month really. Huge over performer.

Master and Commander was neither a hit or flop. I recall expectations ranging from 70m to 150m. It ended up in the lower side but was considered solid yet unspectacular.

It lost a lot of money, and I don't think they ended up making a profit. They spent I think everything they made on a big Oscar Campaign. And the company that made the film, has not made another high profile film since then. Secret Life of Walter Mitty is it's first try a high budget film since M&C

Matrix Revolution's second weekend drop was disgustingly bad especially considering it had a Wednesday opening. Imagine if it had a Friday opening, it could have fell almost 70%

It would have.

Even 10 years later I have not seen The Matrix 3. I loved The Matrix and it was the first DVD I ever bought.

Greatly disliked The Matrix 2 but was there opening weekend.

Matrix 3, no desire to see it even now. Think most of the mainstream audience had the same feeling.

You should see it.

It's my favorite of the trilogy. (I'm alone in this opinion though)

You'd like to be, but you are not. This has been mentioned countless time before too.

For me it was just an OK movie. The execution was just not there. I wouldn't say its a bad movie but the first one SO much better that it came as a letdown ending for me.

Then who else?

Moi.

And I think Bradley Witherberry too.

Algren, Chippy and Bradley Witherberry sharing the same opinion about one film.

The end is nigh.

Huh? It was nominated for ten Oscars, including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Editing, and Best Cinematography, which it won. It may have won more, but this was the year the Academy had to at long last lavish The Lord of the Rings with Oscars. To say it was snubbed by the Oscars is retarded.

And it was a co-production shared by 20th Century Fox, Miramax Films, and Universal Pictures, and I do not believe it scared any of them away from releasing serious films/Oscar hopefuls, though Fox in general does tend to lean more toward overtly commercial fare.

They were just the distributers. They had nothing to do with making the film. There highest success since M&C was fireproof and there biggest budget was The Squid and the Whale.

Ah, you are referring to Samuel Goldwyn Jr. He has almost always tended toward moderately or low budgeted films in his various capacities: as distributor, as financier, etc. Master and Commander is a major exception to his rule, hence the involvement of Fox and the other companies.



http://www.nytimes.com/2004/02/26/garde ... roars.html

And now we wind back the clock to the weekend when we got a 90-minute manifesto on how not to adapt a tiny book.

So... this was the weekend of The Cat in the Hat. It was inevitable that it was going to open at #1 between the source material and the massive advertising blitz, but man the movie was a piece of shit. To dig into the grab bag of tired cat-related jokes, it treated the book as a litter box. Even though it opened pretty well, the expectations were higher (even with ten years of inflation, it's still under The Grinch's unadjusted opening weekend from 2000). I think some parents were probably turned off by just how strange and un-"Seussian" it looked.

Oddly enough, The Cat in the Hat was also the last time Mike Myers had even a moderate success that wasn't a Shrek sequel. It's bizarre how the man just flat-out disappeared apart from returning and misfiring with The Love Guru in 2008. I've read that he's very difficult to work with, so perhaps that's the reason why he's been MIA for so long. Nevertheless, you'd think the guy whose comedy franchise posted some of the biggest opening weekends ever at the times of their releases would be able to get something.

Gothika was a solid performer, even if the questionable quality of the movie has relegated it to the fate of being mostly forgotten.

Elf was still pretty darn impressive in the face of some huge competition for its target audience. It makes sense now that it outgrossed The Cat in the Hat by a significant margin, but I don't remember anyone seeing it coming at the time. Unfortunately, its fellow family outing, Looney Tunes: Back in Action, wasn't so lucky.

I'm still surprised that Master & Commander didn't hold better. The reviews were great, the Oscar buzz was there, and there wasn't anything else aiming for its target audience. I guess I overestimated how much it would cost Fox to sell the movie as being significantly more action-packed than it really was. I do remember some of the other guys in my class complaining about how boring it was in comparison to Pirates of the Caribbean around this time; I didn't see the movie until it returned for its Oscar run in February, and seeing it was a fairly significant moment in my development as a movie buff because I did my best to focus on the characters and the relationships in the absence of huge set pieces outside of the beginning and the climax.

I remember being absolutely shocked that The Matrix Revolutions was so low in just its third weekend. I knew word-of-mouth wasn't that great, but it was still supposed to be a big hit, not something that was going to be an afterthought by week three.

Down at the bottom of the top ten, Radio had completely slipped from my memory. Cuba Gooding, Jr. really should have been mentioned in Kirk Lazarus's "full retard" explanation. At least Sean Penn still somehow got nominated for I Am Sam, whereas Gooding got ripped to shreds for Radio, and would later go on to replace Eddie Murphy in the ill-fated Daddy Day Care sequel.

Ewww The Cat in the Hat. Gross.