As it was already predicted last week, Django Unchained is on pace to become Tarantino’s highest-grossing movie, outpacing Inglourious Basterds at a similar point in its roll out. Easing just 33 percent from last week (by contrast, superhero movies and horror regular have second-weekend drops of more than 50 percent), Django crossed $106 million in its second weekend, something that took Inglourious 23 days. As you’ll learn in any business school, a little controversy over constantly saying n**ger never hurt anyone.
Of course, highest grossing doesn’t mean most successful. Adjusted for inflation, “Pulp Fiction,” which amassed its $200 million-plus nearly 20 years ago, would be the top earner among the Tarantino oeuvre. Moreover, it still ranks as the director’s most successful film having been produced for a meager $8 million. [TheWrap]
As it should be. Meanwhile, Django‘s $20 million take wasn’t the number one of the weekend. That honor goes to Texas Chainsaw 3D.
Texas Chainsaw 3D‘s $23 million was directly between the 2003 remake ($28.1 million) and the 2006 prequel ($18.5 million), though attendance was about in line with the 2006 movie.
Raise your hand if you can explain the plot continuity of those three movies. That way I know which people and I should never hang out.
More so than any other studio, Lionsgate has consistently been successful at making and marketing low-budget genre fare like Texas Chainsaw 3D. They execute cost-effective advertising that smartly hones in on the prospective audience while ignoring everyone else, and the results generally suggest that this is a worthwhile strategy. It doesn’t hurt in this case that Texas Chainsaw is an established brand, and surely fans of the original made up a decent portion of the opening weekend audience.
The movie’s grosses were front-loaded (Friday accounted for 44 percent of the weekend), and it received a weak “C+” CinemaScore; with any other genre, these would be bad signs, but they are both fairly standard in horror. As a result, a final total north of $50 million is definitely doable.
The audience was 52 percent female and 64 percent under 25 year-of-age. Lionsgate is reporting that one in three of those younger attendees stated that a primary reason for their attendance was singer Trey Songz‘s starring role. [BoxOfficeMojo]
Trey who what now? Trey Songz is a person? That’s an interesting name spelling, is he Hungarian? Or is it simply a stage name meant to indicate “lots of songs?” In fact, did anyone else try to read that block quote, only to hear the confusing, unintelligible shriek of children?