This weekend, "The Hunger Games" became the 14th film to cross $400 million at the domestic box office, and the 11th to achieve the feat during its initial release.
The movie, which hit theaters on March 23, crossed the mark Sunday, its 80th day of release. Of the 11 films to cross $400 million at the
domestic box office, "The Hunger Games" was the slowest to do so.
It's also the second movie of 2012 to cross $400 million after "The Avengers," which conversely did it the fastest, in only 14 days. The only other year to see two movies reach the mark was 2009 with "Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen" and "Avatar."
The point of this analysis is to look at how "The Hunger Games" has performed at both the domestic and worldwide box offices and what it portends for the future of the franchise.
Based on the best-selling book by Suzanne Collins, "The Hunger Games" starred Jennifer Lawrence ("Winter's Bone," "X-Men First Class") as Katniss Everdeen with Josh Hutcherson ("The Kids are Alright") as Peeta Mellark and Liam Hemsworth ("The Last Song") as Gale Hawthorne. The cast also included Woody Harrelson, Elizabeth Banks, Lenny Kravitz, Stanley Tucci, Donald Sutherland, Wes Bentley and Toby Jones.
"The Hunger Games" was directed by Gary Ross ("Seabiscuit," "Pleasantville") based on a screenplay from Bill Ray ("State of Play").
First, let's look at the domestic box office, where it has done exceptionally well. "The Hunger Games" currently ranks at number 14 on the all-time list and could potentially move up two more spots if it earns another $3 million. It's also eighth highest non-sequel on the list.
For the first film in a proposed franchise, it started off exceptionally strong, grossing $152 million in its opening weekend. At the time, it was the third highest opening weekend ever ("Avengers" passed it in May), and broke the March opening weekend record set by "Alice in Wonderland" by more than $36 million.
Comparing it to the initial installments in the two other best-selling-books-turned-film franchises, "Harry Potter" and "Twilight," here's how it breaks down:
"Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone" earned $90 million during its 2001 opening weekend and $317 million total at the domestic box office.
"Twilight" in 2008 earned $69 million during its opening weekend and had a total domestic haul of $192 million.
"Sorcerer's Stone" is number 30 on the domestic list and "Twilight" is all the way back at number 129.
Obviously, "The Hunger Games" has done much better than either of these opening salvos, at least at the domestic market (more on that in a moment).
Looking forward, these franchises give us slightly different forecasts. With "Harry Potter, it wasn't until the eighth and final film in the series, "Deathly Hallows, Part II," that any of the subsequent installments surpassed "Sorcerer's Stone," grossing $381 million. Over in "Twilight" land, however, each of the next films far out-grossed the first installment, exceeding its total by $90 million or more.
Of course, if we expand out somewhat, we'll see other examples where franchises blossomed in their second installments, such as "Pirates of the Caribbean" and "The Dark Knight" (although there were obvious extenuating circumstance with the latter). Then there's "Spider-Man," which grossed an almost equal $403 million, compared to its sequel, which earned $373 million.
With "Catching Fire," the sequel to "The Hunger Games," set for release in the more box office friendly November 2013, I'd wager that we could see an improvement on the first film's already successful foundation.
If the "The Hunger Games" faltered, it would be overseas. Despite it's $400 million haul here, it only grossed another $247 million overseas for a worldwide total of $648.1 million. That's good for 56th place on the all-time worldwide list, compared to its 14th place finish domestically.
The result is an exceptionally low percentage coming from overseas--38.2 percent--when you look at the top grossing movies. No other film in the top 100 has a lower percentage. In fact, of the 55 films in front of it, only three have percentages under 50, and two of those--"E.T." and "Star Wars"--are re-releases of older films from an era when the overseas box office did not have nearly the impact it does today.
Again comparing the opening installments of the other two franchises, "Sorcerer's Stone" grossed $657 million, or 67.4 percent of its total gross of $974 million. "Twilight" didn't have quite the worldwide audience when it first hit theaters, grossing $199 million or 50.9 percent of its $392 million total.
The two franchises also differ in how they followed up in subsequent installments, with the "Harry Potter" films holding pretty much steady with a overseas percentage hovering between 68 and 71 percent, only a few percentage points' increase. Notably, as with the domestic numbers, it wasn't until the end that the films topped Sorcerer's Stone," although in this case, "Deathly Hallows, Part I" did it as well as "Part II."
With "Twilight," however, it was able to improve its overseas percentage, even as its domestic numbers jumped as well. The percentages ran between 57 and 60 percent as the numbers increased to nearly $300 million per film.
So we'll start on the domestic side. "Harry Potter" and "Twilight" went in opposite directions after their first movies. I would say just on the fact that how well "The Hunger Games" did with a March release, compared to the more favorable holiday releases of its contemporaries, it has a good shot at going up.
If we split the difference between the decline "Harry Potter" saw and the jump "Twilight" saw between movies one and two, we come to a $52 million increase. Of course, that would put "Catching Fire" as the seventh highest grossing film ever, ahead of "Shrek 2," which sits at $441 million and coincidentally serves as a good example at how well a sequel can perform compared to the original ("Shrek" earned $267 million).
We've already decided that "Catching Fire" should increase, but I'm still worried about diminishing returns due to the already high domestic total of "The Hunger Games." So, let's stick swith our Solomon total of a $52 million jump.
On to the overseas market. If we look at the franchises at the point they began their film careers, "The Hunger Games" is more comparable to the "Twilight" series as the "Harry Potter" books enjoyed much more worldwide recognition from the beginning.
So, that should mean we can expect to see a significant increase in the franchise's performance overseas in its subsequent films--two or three more, depending on the studio's final decision on whether to split the third book, "Mockingjay," in two.
If we use the dollars growth the "Twilight" series saw from the first film to the second (jumping from $199 million to $413 million), that would mean "Catching Fire" could earn in the neighborhood of $500 million. That would of course depend on the book and film series growing in popularity overseas, but again with the more favorable release date for "Catching Fire," I'd wager it is possible.
Putting those numbers together, we have a $452 million domestic haul and a $500 million overseas take, totalling $952 million, compared to current total of "The Hunger Games," which sits at $648 million.
For now, however, all we can do is wait and watch.
(All of the box office numbers came from BoxOfficeMojo.com)
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| It's the 14th film to cross $400 million. |
It's also the second movie of 2012 to cross $400 million after "The Avengers," which conversely did it the fastest, in only 14 days. The only other year to see two movies reach the mark was 2009 with "Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen" and "Avatar."
The point of this analysis is to look at how "The Hunger Games" has performed at both the domestic and worldwide box offices and what it portends for the future of the franchise.
Based on the best-selling book by Suzanne Collins, "The Hunger Games" starred Jennifer Lawrence ("Winter's Bone," "X-Men First Class") as Katniss Everdeen with Josh Hutcherson ("The Kids are Alright") as Peeta Mellark and Liam Hemsworth ("The Last Song") as Gale Hawthorne. The cast also included Woody Harrelson, Elizabeth Banks, Lenny Kravitz, Stanley Tucci, Donald Sutherland, Wes Bentley and Toby Jones.
"The Hunger Games" was directed by Gary Ross ("Seabiscuit," "Pleasantville") based on a screenplay from Bill Ray ("State of Play").
Domestic Box Office
First, let's look at the domestic box office, where it has done exceptionally well. "The Hunger Games" currently ranks at number 14 on the all-time list and could potentially move up two more spots if it earns another $3 million. It's also eighth highest non-sequel on the list.
For the first film in a proposed franchise, it started off exceptionally strong, grossing $152 million in its opening weekend. At the time, it was the third highest opening weekend ever ("Avengers" passed it in May), and broke the March opening weekend record set by "Alice in Wonderland" by more than $36 million.
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| The first film grossed $317 million. |
"Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone" earned $90 million during its 2001 opening weekend and $317 million total at the domestic box office.
"Twilight" in 2008 earned $69 million during its opening weekend and had a total domestic haul of $192 million.
"Sorcerer's Stone" is number 30 on the domestic list and "Twilight" is all the way back at number 129.
Obviously, "The Hunger Games" has done much better than either of these opening salvos, at least at the domestic market (more on that in a moment).
Looking forward, these franchises give us slightly different forecasts. With "Harry Potter, it wasn't until the eighth and final film in the series, "Deathly Hallows, Part II," that any of the subsequent installments surpassed "Sorcerer's Stone," grossing $381 million. Over in "Twilight" land, however, each of the next films far out-grossed the first installment, exceeding its total by $90 million or more.
Of course, if we expand out somewhat, we'll see other examples where franchises blossomed in their second installments, such as "Pirates of the Caribbean" and "The Dark Knight" (although there were obvious extenuating circumstance with the latter). Then there's "Spider-Man," which grossed an almost equal $403 million, compared to its sequel, which earned $373 million.
With "Catching Fire," the sequel to "The Hunger Games," set for release in the more box office friendly November 2013, I'd wager that we could see an improvement on the first film's already successful foundation.
Worldwide Box Office
If the "The Hunger Games" faltered, it would be overseas. Despite it's $400 million haul here, it only grossed another $247 million overseas for a worldwide total of $648.1 million. That's good for 56th place on the all-time worldwide list, compared to its 14th place finish domestically.
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| The franchise improved overseas. |
Again comparing the opening installments of the other two franchises, "Sorcerer's Stone" grossed $657 million, or 67.4 percent of its total gross of $974 million. "Twilight" didn't have quite the worldwide audience when it first hit theaters, grossing $199 million or 50.9 percent of its $392 million total.
The two franchises also differ in how they followed up in subsequent installments, with the "Harry Potter" films holding pretty much steady with a overseas percentage hovering between 68 and 71 percent, only a few percentage points' increase. Notably, as with the domestic numbers, it wasn't until the end that the films topped Sorcerer's Stone," although in this case, "Deathly Hallows, Part I" did it as well as "Part II."
With "Twilight," however, it was able to improve its overseas percentage, even as its domestic numbers jumped as well. The percentages ran between 57 and 60 percent as the numbers increased to nearly $300 million per film.
Conclusions
So we'll start on the domestic side. "Harry Potter" and "Twilight" went in opposite directions after their first movies. I would say just on the fact that how well "The Hunger Games" did with a March release, compared to the more favorable holiday releases of its contemporaries, it has a good shot at going up.
If we split the difference between the decline "Harry Potter" saw and the jump "Twilight" saw between movies one and two, we come to a $52 million increase. Of course, that would put "Catching Fire" as the seventh highest grossing film ever, ahead of "Shrek 2," which sits at $441 million and coincidentally serves as a good example at how well a sequel can perform compared to the original ("Shrek" earned $267 million).
We've already decided that "Catching Fire" should increase, but I'm still worried about diminishing returns due to the already high domestic total of "The Hunger Games." So, let's stick swith our Solomon total of a $52 million jump.
On to the overseas market. If we look at the franchises at the point they began their film careers, "The Hunger Games" is more comparable to the "Twilight" series as the "Harry Potter" books enjoyed much more worldwide recognition from the beginning.
So, that should mean we can expect to see a significant increase in the franchise's performance overseas in its subsequent films--two or three more, depending on the studio's final decision on whether to split the third book, "Mockingjay," in two.
If we use the dollars growth the "Twilight" series saw from the first film to the second (jumping from $199 million to $413 million), that would mean "Catching Fire" could earn in the neighborhood of $500 million. That would of course depend on the book and film series growing in popularity overseas, but again with the more favorable release date for "Catching Fire," I'd wager it is possible.
Putting those numbers together, we have a $452 million domestic haul and a $500 million overseas take, totalling $952 million, compared to current total of "The Hunger Games," which sits at $648 million.
For now, however, all we can do is wait and watch.
(All of the box office numbers came from BoxOfficeMojo.com)
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