I Am Legend - movie betting

stereoman · #1 11-21-2007, 02:16 PM

Movies opening on December 14th are I Am Legend, Juno, The Kite Runner, The Perfect Holiday and Alvin and the Chipmunks.

Early tracking doesn't seem to be particularly high at the moment suggesting that IAL will open to $43 million (I grabbed that number from Box office Mojo via the Hollywood Stock Exchange).

It has a kind of an I, Robot feel to it and that opened to $52.1 million back in July 2004.

Will Smith action movies generally don't appear in December but last year, The Pursuit of Happyness had a $26.5 million opening weekend.

ThomasSly · #2 11-21-2007, 03:10 PM

This movie looks interesting, and the campain of publicity was quite big, i remember seeing preview of this at least 3 months back.

I would say it's gonna open at least at 40m.

llabb · #3 11-21-2007, 05:18 PM

Yeah, I think this movie will do well, and that somewhere in the $40's sounds good. I mean, a 40+ million dollar opening is pretty huge in Dec. It's $50m that's questionable, but that's where the line is.

If people think that $40's is likely, then there may be a play on Under 50.

darko3131 · #4 11-22-2007, 04:49 AM

$50 million for a Dec. opening? Without doing any research my gut just says under, way under. Beowulf had tons of marketing and got very solid reviews and only did $27. Why would Legend do twice as much?

llabb · #5 11-22-2007, 01:28 PM

Yeah, that's the question. A number of offers on Matchbook. You can even get the Under at +102 right now.

brendanb438 · #6 11-23-2007, 12:36 AM

hey llabb hows it been?

I agree the under looks like the solid play at this time. Still too earlier for rough theatre counts right? I just don't see a vampire/zombie movie doing well in December, even with Willy Smith. $40 Mill would be an amazing opening. $50 highly unlikely unless this gets amazing reviews and screen counts.

Also why the random movie bet all of a sudden on Matchbook. I don't see any other sites offering a line on this so this confuses me a bunch.

-Brendan

Cry Me A River · #7 11-23-2007, 08:23 PM

Historically, how many movies have opened for $50M+ in December? Or even close (including inflation adjustments)?

LOTR did $66M in 2001
Two Towers did $62M in 2002
Return of the King did $72M in 2003

So it's def possible, but, the bet is essentially that I Am Legend is the new LOTR? There's basically nothing opening against it, but still, unless Matchbook has some inside info (focus groups?) this seems like a sucker's bet. Does look very suspicious - Almost a bar stool pundit type bet (everybody agrees the line is ridic and the under is a lock... and everybody gets screwed).