Universal

While streamers typically get by on thrifty marketing budgets, pushing content largely on their menus, most motion picture studios, like Universal, still have all the superpowers in the world to blast a movie out of a canon. But here’s something to keep in mind as we detail Universal’s promo playbook below in propelling Illumination/Nintendo’s Super
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Universal Pictures, Atomic Monster and Blumhouse’s Night Swim is now opening on Jan. 5, 2024 instead of Jan. 19. That first weekend of the New Year is a highly coveted spot for horror movies. That’s where Blumhouse/Universal’s M3GAN opened to $30.4M and went on to gross $95M. Night Swim logline: No running. No diving. No
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Deadline’s Most Valuable Blockbuster tournament took a hiatus during the pandemic as movie theaters closed for the majority of 2020-2021 and theatrical day-and-date titles on both the big screen and studios’ respective streaming platforms became more prevalent. Coming back from that brink, the studios have largely returned to their theatrical release models and the downstream
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THURSDAY UPDATE, Refresh for latest…: With numbers now in for the 44 overseas markets that opened on Wednesday, Illumination/Nintendo/Universal’s The Super Mario Bros Movie had a more than peachy debut with $34.7M through yesterday at the international box office. Combined with Wednesday’s domestic bow, the global one-day total is $66.4M. Several milestones/records were set in
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Illumination/Nintendo/Universal’s Super Mario Bros Movie doesn’t need a mushroom to get bigger, it just organically is. Out of the gate today Wednesday, sans any Tuesday previews, the feature take of the classic game is looking at $26M, for what’s translating into a $86.2M 3-day, $127.5M Wednesday through Sunday haul. Interesting, even though its opening day
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Disney’s live-action take on The Little Mermaid has been cleared for theatrical release in China, as has Fast X — the penultimate installment in Universal’s long-running Fast & Furious action franchise. Dates are still to be set for both films in the market which has increasingly been handing out day-and-date releases for Hollywood titles even
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EXCLUSIVE: Illumination/Universal/Nintendo’s The Super Mario Bros Movie just landed on tracking this morning ahead of its Easter weekend release, and the animated film is shaping up to make at least $85M-$90M+ over its Wednesday through Sunday launch — and that’s on the conservative side. Given the fervent response by fans to trailers, it would not
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“‘Nobody likes to watch people getting eaten by lions.” Apparently this was the response by the late Sumner Redstone during his National Amusement exhibition days after he saw a screening of the 1981 Tom Skerritt lion movie, Savage Harvest, relayed to me by an exhibition source who overheard him. As funny as Redstone’s reaction was, it’s
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Universal/Illumination/Nintendo’s The Super Mario Bros Movie has become the latest Hollywood title to secure a release date in China. The big-screen spin on the iconic videogame franchise will hit Chinese cinemas on April 5, in time for Ching Ming Festival and in step with some other international markets as well as two days before the
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FRIDAY PM: Oh no, those tepid audience exits and B CinemaScore are impacting the second weekend of Disney/Marvel Studios’ Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania, which is currently seeing an OMG 71% drop with a $30M second FSS and a $7.8M second Friday, -83% (read the review). If that estimate holds, it’s worse than Thor: Love
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EXCLUSIVE: Timothy Scott Bogart’s movie Spinning Gold, about his music-producer father Neil Bogart and the iconic label Casablanca Records that he built, will hit theaters on March 31, 2023. The release and distribution will be handled by Hero Partners in partnership with Howling Wolf Films, with Universal Pictures Home Entertainment distributing across transactional home entertainment.  Neil
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The Universal/Blumhouse/Atomic Monster genre film M3GAN is hitting screens a week earlier than its original MLK weekend date, and now will be released January 6. The pic from director Gerard Johnstone and producers James Wan and Jason Blum moves onto a date where there’s Sony’s untitled True Haunting movie, and away from New Line’s House
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The over-under on Universal/Blumhouse/Miramax’s Halloween Kills for its debut weekend is $50 million at 3,800 theaters. Some even see it possibly touching $60M, and that’s with a theatrical day-and-date on Peacock. That opening alone is what all films have been averaging at the box office over the last three weekends: $55M. In 2021, Part 2
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There might be a box office surprise this weekend in Paramount’s horror movie Smile. Yes, we’re serious. The pic, from writer-director Parker Finn, was developed by Paramount Players, and the studio took a wait-and-see approach as to where would land — on Paramount+ or theatrical. Then Paramount held a test screening, and Smile played to great
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The dinosaurs have done it as Universal/Amblin’s Jurassic World Dominion crossed the $1B mark at the global box office with Thursday’s business included. It took a little while, but that shouldn’t diminish that this makes the Colin Trevorrow-directed installment, one of only three films to the milestone since the beginning of the pandemic. It is
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In the wake of the death of Queen Elizabeth II, Universal has chosen to delay the UK release of the Julia Roberts/George Clooney romantic comedy Ticket to Paradise “out of respect to the Royal Family.” Originally scheduled to release this coming Friday (September 16), the Working Title film from director Ol Parker will instead go
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“I do think the studies will get paid, like they usually do, whatever they are owed. Because we are the suppliers and that’s usually what happens,” Lionsgate vice chair Michael Burns said Wednesday of the Chapter 11 filing earlier in the day by Regal Cinemas’ parent Cineworld. “Those things seem to go through the same
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Universal/Illumination’s Minions: The Rise of Gru bowed in China today (Friday), grossing an estimated RMB 21.74M ($3.2M), including midnights. This was good for the biggest opening day of a Hollywood animated film during the pandemic. Overall, and not including China’s Friday, Rise of Gru has grossed $461.2M at the international box office for $807.7M worldwide.
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Sunday AM: While Crunchyroll’s Dragon Ball Super: Super Hero is coming in at the lower end of what we foresaw yesterday with $20.1M (still significantly more than what we were spotting Friday AM), Universal’s Beast grew some teeth last night, improving its 3-day from $10.1M to now $11.57M. That’s after a $4.27M Saturday that’s -1% from Friday
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Illumination Entertainment/Universal’s Minions: The Rise of Gru didn’t stop making money just because it wasn’t a holiday. The pic’s gross yesterday saw $18.9M, which is easily the best Tuesday ever for an Illumination Entertainment title at the domestic box office, besting the $17.5M made by the animation studio’s Sing on Dec. 27, 2016. Rise of Gru‘s Tuesday
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With Illumination/Universal’s Minions: The Rise Of Gru continuing its dastardly ways at the global box office, the origins story has propelled the Despicable Me franchise across the $4B mark worldwide. The Chris Meledandri-produced series was already the biggest animated franchise of all time, and now has another milestone to boot. Across all five films, the
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After releasing early in Australia last weekend, Universal/Illumination’s Minions: The Rise Of Gru is looking groovy at the international box office, adding $14.6M in 39 new offshore market openings across Wednesday and Thursday. Coupled with Oz’s first week, the running offshore cume through yesterday is $22.5M. A further 21 markets open today including the UK
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Universal/Illumination’s Minions: The Rise of Gru has grabbed the best previews for an animated movie during the pandemic with $10.75M. That’s purely from showtimes that started yesterday at 2PM from 3,350 theaters. This, no doubt, bodes for another excellent weekend at the summer box office. That beats the $6.25M combined two day previews of Paramount’s Sonic
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After a two year delay due to the pandemic, Illumination/Universal’s Minions: The Rise of Gru, the fifth movie in the Despicable Me/Minions universe, arrives looking to lead the Independence Day domestic box office with $70M-$80M over 4-days, and another $70M+ abroad for a potential $150M global launch. There are no other major studio wide entries over July 4th
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