Some prehistoric animated animals and a cross species experiment go at it again. Yes, I’m talking about Ice Age: Continental Drift and The Amazing Spider-Man, the films that have been dominating the international charts for the past 2 weeks, now waging war on American soil.
Ice Age: Continental Drift is the clear favorite this weekend for various reason. For one thing it’s only the 3rd animated film of the summer after Madagascar 3 and Brave, both big hits that should finish above $200 million. Now those two might have saturated the market a bit, but certainly not enough to make Ice Age 4 a miss. Then there’s the fact that this is the only wide release of the weekend, also making my job here a lot easier. Finally, this is Ice Age, one of the biggest animated franchises in the world, maybe more in the world then in North America, but still.
The first Ice Age opened with $46.3 million back in 2002 and finished with $176.3 million. The sequel, Ice Age: The Meltdown, grabbed $68 million on its debut weekend and then went on to gross $195.3 million. Three years ago, Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs had a total of $196.5 million, so you can see how each time these films made more and more money. Well I’m here to tell you that’s about to change with Ice Age: Continental Drift, at least according to me (and really, ignore me if you don’t agree). I think Ice Age 4 won’t do more than $50 million, actually I more inclined to think it will end up close to the $46 million of the first film in the series. Regardless, that’s more than enough for #1.
The Amazing Spider-Man has some serious competition coming out next week so it has to grab as much money as possible in the next 6 days. This weekend I think $34 million should be a good number that will bring the film to a 13 day total of $200 million. Back in 2002 Spider-Man had $237 million after 13 days, Spider-Man 2 $262.2 million, while Spider-Man 3 $250.4 million. Clearly The Amazing Spider-Man ain’t looking so amazing when compared to those.
Ted looks like the only candidate for 3rd place, $20 million or so for over $157 million after 17 days. Meanwhile Brave will have 4th place for itself with $12 million for the weekend and a new total of $196 million.
Magic Mike should round out the top 5 with $8 million or so, that will be over $90 million after 17 days.
Next week we have the final chapter in Christopher Nolan’s Batman trilogy, The Dark Knight Rises, which is bound to break a few records during its box office run.
