‘Avatar’ Arrived, but Will It Deliver?
Avatar
By BROOKS BARNES
Published: December 18, 2009
LOS ANGELES — For weeks this movie capital has crackled with speculation on a lone topic: Will James Cameron’s “Avatar,” one of the biggest motion pictures — in budget and scope — ever made, soar or sputter at the box office?
The first multiplex tea leaves for the movie arrived on Friday morning. In midnight screenings “Avatar,” a futuristic 3-D spectacle about love and war set on a distant moon, sold about $3.5 million in tickets at theaters in the United States and Canada, said 20th Century Fox, the studio behind the film.
That total is on a par with movies that are not built around pre-existing brands. But it falls short of expectations for such a buzzed-about picture, given its higher 3-D ticket prices, positive reviews and Mr. Cameron’s résumé.
“The midnights are not what some people dreamed they might be, but they are totally fine,” said Paul Dergarabedian, president of the box office division of Hollywood.com, a tracking service. “This is a long-term play.”
Fox says it expects “Avatar” to gross between $50 million and $60 million for the weekend in North America, with more than 100 foreign countries easily bringing in $100 million more. The studio was concerned on Friday that a major snowstorm forecast this weekend for the East Coast could keep moviegoers at home.
It is a frequent Hollywood practice, of course, to tamp down expectations by low-balling estimates. Film executives dread Monday headlines about softer-than-anticipated opening weekends, especially for Christmas movies, which historically hold up better than summer blockbusters in subsequent weekends.
Industry expectations for “Avatar” are much higher. Rival studios say that audience-tracking surveys indicate that weekend ticket sales in North America will total about $80 million. The film is playing in 3,452 theaters, about 60 percent of which are charging an additional $3 to $5 for the 3-D presentation.
“I Am Legend,” the post-apocalyptic Will Smith picture from 2007, holds the record for a December opening weekend with $77.2 million. It went on to sell $585.3 million in tickets at the global box office.
How many tickets “Avatar” will sell is no small question for Fox and its financing partners, Dune Entertainment and Ingenious Film Partners. “Avatar” cost Fox around $310 million to produce — although tax credits will shave about $30 million off that bill — and an estimated $150 million to market.
To what degree word of mouth and positive reviews will push up the sales total is still unknown. A burst of upbeat chatter appeared on social-networking Web sites after the midnight shows. And critics have cheered the film with a voraciousness rarely seen for effects-driven extravaganzas; more than 90 percent of top critics have given “Avatar” positive marks, according to the review aggregation site Rottentomatoes.com.
“Avatar” has presented Fox with many marketing headaches. Initial reaction to a conventional trailer was flat, and response to a 3-D Imax preview provoked doubts about whether the picture was really a cinematic game-changer.
To succeed “Avatar” needs to attract moviegoers of all ages. Advance ticket sales have been strong, particularly among older men, but younger audiences — notably teenage girls — appear more skeptical. Online ticket sellers like Fandango.com say advance interest in “Avatar” has been stronger than for some recent blockbusters, among them “Star Trek” and “2012.” But it is lagging behind the year’s big sequels, including “Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen.”
Expectations are also high for “Avatar” because it is Mr. Cameron’s first feature film since the Oscar-winning “Titanic,” which opened in 1997 and became one of the best-selling movies in history.
Fox can take comfort in knowing that for its opening weekend, “Titanic” brought in just $45 million, when adjusted for inflation, and it went on to make $1.8 billion at the worldwide box office.
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