Weekend Box Office Predictions Game: Alone on Shutter Island

February 17, 2010

Valentine's Day made or broke the Weekend Box Office Prophet game last week with its huge $56+ million opening. The Prophet was nearly on the money with his V-Day prediction, finished third and beat the average player scores 4-1 (view last round's results). That means the prizes from last week will roll into this new round.

The top finishers from last weekend including Valentine's Day, The Wolf Man, Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Lightning Thief and James Cameron's Avatar are being joined this week by Martin Scorsese's period psychological thriller Shutter Island starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Mark Ruffalo, Ben Kingsley and Michelle Williams. Can Martin and Leo beat out three films last weekend that topped $30 million a-piece?

The object of this game is to guess the final domestic box office dollars in millions for these five films from Friday, February 19 through Sunday, February 21. Your prediction is averaged in with the other players for a cumulative score to compete against the Prophet predictions (view the leaderboard).

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 four prizes:

Mystic River on Blu-ray Disc
Walk the Line on Blu-ray Disc
Halo Legends on Blu-ray Disc
Universal Soldier Regeneration on DVD

If the Prophet wins then all four prizes will rollover into the next round and be joined by a fourth. Should 100 or more players participate then the top finisher will receive a prize should the Prophet beat the players.

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 the evening of Thursday, February 18, with this round's results being published in the next round's game page on Tuesday.

There are currently 57 players up against the Prophet

The entry period for February 19 - 21 has already ended. Follow the weekly results at the Weekend Box Office Prophet main page.

Shutter Island
Shutter Island, originally intended for release last October, is the only new wide release film this week. Early word has been upbeat and Leonardo DiCaprio is usually a strong box office draw. The Wolf Man proved last week that R-rated scares are still in style. Opens on 2,500 screens.

All: $31.3 Me: n/a Prophet: $34.6 Actual: $41.1

Valentine's Day
Valentine's Day blew away estimates and closed its first three days in theaters with over $56 million. With the romantic holiday in the rear-view mirror, a substantial drop could be in the cards. Then again, its only new competition targets the opposite demographic.

All: $25.6 Me: n/a Prophet: $25.2 Actual: $16.7

Percy Jackson & The Olympians: The Lightning Thief
Percy Jackson slipped to third place from Fri-Sun just behind The Wolf Man but still managed to clear $30 million. A good sign for the son of Poseidon is the film only dropped 27% on Monday and beat all others at the box office, Avatar and Valentine's Day included.

All: $20.4 Me: n/a Prophet: $18.5 Actual: $15.3

The Wolfman
The Wolf Man howled past poor critical response to take second place last weekend with $31.5 weekend. A 63% drop from Sunday to Monday does not bode well for Joe Johnston's reimagining of the Universal classic heading into next weekend, neither does the arrival of Shutter Island.

All: $17.0 Me: n/a Prophet: $13.8 Actual: $9.9

Avatar
I was ready to remove Avatar from the game this round but could not justify an exit based on the film going up 3% last weekend versus the previous. The additional $22.6 million pushes it ever closer to the $700 million domestic mark. It should drop again this weekend without the holiday but still perform strong.

All: $17.9 Me: n/a Prophet: $16.4 Actual: $16.2