BOX OFFICE ANALYSIS:

The box office slump hit pretty hard over the holiday weekend. While retail sales everywhere else skyrocketed to record numbers, Hollywood took a 12% hit when compared to this time last year. It’s going to be difficult to predict how some of these films ultimately do. Now that we’re in the holiday season, something like “Hugo” that looks like a bust could have surprising legs straight through to Christmas and actually end up doing pretty well.

The upcoming competition doesn’t look overwhelming, especially for films aimed at kids. “Hugo,” “The Muppets,” and  ”Arthur Christmas” have the field pretty much to themselves until December 16 when the third “Alvin and the Chipmunks” opens.

1. The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 1: $62.3M — Keeping pretty close pace with its predecessor. With a $110M budget and a total take of $221M in just 10 days, the break-even is probably close to $300M, which is what “Eclipse” did domestically. Another $400M poured in from overseas. These movies are money-making machines.

2. The Muppets: $42.2M — Word of mouth almost assures this will have legs through Christmas. Everyone seems to love it.

3. Happy Feet Two: $18.4M — With a total take of $44M over 10 days, this is a genuine flop. Again, I think the politics of the previous entry turned off a lot of parents. People enjoyed “Happy Feet;” I know I did, but the liberal eco-messaging diminished the fun and left a bad taste. Especially off-putting is how that messaging was aimed at children. Hollywood used to teach universal values to our kids. Honesty, bravery, and loyalty were the themes of the day. Now it’s divisive issues like global warming and gay marriage. Hollywood overstepped on this one and 600 people lost their jobs.

4. Arthur Christmas $17M: — This has to be a disappointment. Because it’s the only offering this season with “Christmas” in the title, that might help as the season rolls on, but the overall concept seemed tired to me. How many movies are out there that promise to show us how Santa is able to deliver all those toys in just one night? Hollywood has to remember that home video is a reality. They might not have been born when it was released, but everyone over the age of eight has already seen “The Santa Clause.”

5. Hugo: $15.4M — Scorsese’s 3D entry had a terrific per screen take of $12,000, but that’s a wee bit less than the “Muppets” and far less than “Breaking Dawn” in its second week. There’s talk that the epic will expand closer to Christmas, but by then it will have to compete with Spielberg’s “Tintin.” Reportedly, the film cost well over $100M to produce.

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The Los Angeles Times:

“For those who like renting movies, Hollywood may soon have a message: Prepare to wait.

“In an effort to push consumers toward buying more movies, some major film studios are considering a new policy that would block DVDs from being offered for rental until several weeks after going on sale.

“Under the plan, new DVD releases would be available on a purchase-only basis for a few weeks, after which time companies such as Blockbuster Inc. and Netflix Inc. would be allowed to rent the DVDs to their customers. The move comes as the studios are grappling with sharply declining DVD revenue, which has long propped up the movie business.

“Reed Hastings, chief executive of DVD-by-mail company Netflix, revealed that he had discussed delayed-rental proposals with several of his biggest suppliers. People close to the situation at several studios confirmed that such plans were under consideration and probably would take effect next year. (more…)

Everyone seems to have an opinion as to why DVD sales have cratered since hitting their peak in 2006, but no one’s looking at the obvious answer. Plunging sales have been blamed on piracy, competing technologies such as video games and low-priced rental outlets like Redbox … everything but the quality of the actual films.

First and foremost, I’m a movie lover. Nothing competes for my attention in this regard, including dollar rentals and the like. But I’m just not buying anywhere near the number of new releases I did just ten years ago. Obviously, this is anecdotal evidence, so make your own comparisons:

1998  – I purchased 15 of the top 20 money makers…

1999 — 18 of the top 20.

2000 — 16 of the top 20.

2001 — 14 of the top 20. (more…)