Weekend Recap: May 16 - 18

Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian came in one step short of the original over the weekend with an estimated $56.6 million from 3,929 theaters. The original – The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe opened to $65.6 million in December of 2005. Considering ticket sale inflation, the opening is pretty much in line with the first Lord of the Rings entry – Fellowship – which debuted with $47.2 million in 2001, which is not a good sign, and means something went wrong somewhere down the line. The first Narnia topped with $291.7 million domestically, and Prince Caspian has already failed to live up to the first one’s opening weekend stature as a big sequel. And it also has Indiana Jones to deal with in just a matter of days. The first Narnia opened in December and had the benefit of Christmas when kids are out, while Prince Caspian still has about a month to go before kids are out from school.

After a bomb of an opening weekend of not even getting to $20 million, Speed Racer took a nose dive to $7.6 million in its second weekend, putting its total at $29.8 million, with final prospects looking like around $40 million. For Warner Bros., the performance is in sync with last summer’s big budget bomb, Poseidon, which debuted to $22.2 million and finished with $60.7 million. Poseidon also dropped 58% in its second week to $9.2 million.

Next week, Indiana Jones will probably take a big bite out of everything in its path. Comparison wise with Thursday and Monday, Indy 4 is contending with the 5-day grosses of The Phantom Menace ($105.7 million), Attack of the Clones ($110.2 million), The Matrix Reloaded ($134.3 million 4-day), and Revenge of the Sith ($158.4 million 4-day). Spielberg and Lucas have not teamed up since The Last Crusade in 1989, which should lead to epic box office results. Prince Caspian should be in the mid-$20’s next week and Iron Man will probably get its first big drop after holding up remarkably well for three weeks, and the rest of the top ten should be well under $10 million.