Crowd Report Analysis: Nymphomaniac

Nymphomaniac is a concept that was only going to perform at a few theaters out of its total of 22 venues and I knew it was going to bomb outside of Los Angeles and New York. At its location in West LA the film enjoyed healthy attendance at its one art-house on opening day and I calculated that it was likely grossing between $6,500 and 7,500. Shows before 7:00 were empty but the evening show ended up roughly half filled of 300 seats and it ended up selling out the 9:40 show. There was a small line down the street for the evening and a line for the 9:40 show that was about three times as long in length, and the late midnight show looked like it was attracting on the level of 7:00. Lars von Trier makes strange films that make it hard to figure out how the audience is reacting but the crowd at 9:40 at least seemed to admire the picture and its dark sense of humor was getting some chuckles. I heard a few people coming out of the 7:00 show gossiping about its quality and I heard a few young women in their twenties comment that they were definitely coming back for Volume 2 in April to see how everything in the story comes full circle in the end. Comparison wise, Melancholia almost sold out the entire Saturday at this theater and grossed between $25 and 30,000 over its weekend here, whereas Nymphomaniac is falling behind and none of the Saturday showtimes have sold out. Melancholia averaged $13,535 per-screen from 19 theaters which means this theater was double the normal business. The Friday average for Nymphomaniac was barely above $2,000 per-screen which means its weekend take is going to be between $5 and 7,000 per-screen. I’m guessing this theater will end up being around three times that figure while most other theaters will have grossed a third of this theater's revenue. It’s looking like a weekend of around $150,000 followed by a rapid decline in following weeks in averages as most people outside of risqué territories aren’t going to want to touch this film.