Weekend Box Office Predictions Game: A Nightmare on Furry Street

April 27, 2010

Things were a bit crazy here last week so we had to skip the Weekend Box Office Prophet game. Looking back to the last round played two weeks ago, the Prophet fell 1-4 to very strong predictions from the players (view the last round's results). With the player win, top Myt wins James Cameron's Avatar on Blu-ray. Congratulations!

This weekend, the remake of A Nightmare on Elm Street squares off against Brendan Frasier in Furry Vengeance. Holdovers How to Train Your Dragon, The Back-Up Plan and The Losers round out our five eligible films.

The game's objective is to guess the final domestic box office dollars in millions for these five films from Friday, April 30 through Sunday, May 2. Your prediction is averaged in with the other players for a cumulative score to compete against the Prophet predictions.

Should the average player differences between the actual box office gross and predicted grosses beat the Prophet for 3 or more of the 5 films, the top player will win The Twilight Saga: New Moon Special Edition on Blu-ray. A tie goes in favor of the players.

If the Prophet wins then this prize will rollover into the next round and be joined by another. We will still award a small prize to the top place finisher should that happen (view the overall leaderboard).

Once you are logged in, the average player scores will update in real time below as new predictions are entered. The entry period will close at 9pm PST Thursday, April 29, with this round's results being published in the next round's game page next Tuesday.

There are currently 48 players up against the Prophet

The entry period for April 30 - May 2 has already ended. Follow the weekly results at the Weekend Box Office Prophet main page.

Furry Vengeance
Brendan Frasier and his posse of CGI furry critters hope to eat into the success How to Train Your Dragon continues to enjoy weeks after its debut. Summit is likely staring at another Astro Boy rather than Twilight as buzz for Frasier's latest has been next to nil. Opens on 2,800 screens.

All: $10.9 Me: n/a Prophet: $7.3 Actual: $6.6

A Nightmare on Elm Street (2010)
Freddy Krueger without Robert Englund? It's happening whether you like it or not. The horror reboot follows behind Friday the 13th which opened to a huge $40.6 million weekend in February 2009. Elm Street could easily put up similar numbers based on curiosity alone. Opens on 3,150 screens.

All: $34.5 Me: n/a Prophet: $42.3 Actual: $32.9

How to Train Your Dragon
How to Train Your Dragon is coming off two straight weekend wins but will have a hard time avoiding Freddy's claws this weekend. If it can keep its decline in the 20-30% range then another $10+ weekend is certainly not out of the question after making $15.4 million last weekend.

All: $11.2 Me: n/a Prophet: $11.5 Actual: $10.6

The Back-Up Plan
The Jennifer Lopez romantic comedy from CBS Films managed to pull in $12.2 in its debut last weekend despite being ripped to shreds by critics. J-Lo still has some pull left, but the odds of this film being back up over $10 million again are not worth betting against.

All: $7.4 Me: n/a Prophet: $7.9 Actual: $7.3

The Losers
The Losers reviewed stronger than The Back-Up Plan but failed to crack $10 million without a big star (Chris Evans and Zoe Saldana aren't there yet) and some questionable advertising. With only a $9.2 million debut, its second weekend could dip to $5 million or lower with male audiences eying Freddy instead.

All: $5.6 Me: n/a Prophet: $5.6 Actual: $5.9