User blog:Ceauntay/'Moana' Sets Sights on $80+ Million 5-Day Thanksgiving Debut

The last three years have seen Thanksgiving weekend topped by a film in the Hunger Games franchise. Before that it was the Twilight franchise that led the way. In fact, not since 2008 has a major franchise film not led the three-day Thanksgiving weekend with Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - Part 1 filling a gap left by Twilight in 2010. That said, over the course of those seven years three of the top five three-day and five-day Thanksgiving openings have occurred, none of which finished #1 and all of them were animated features from Disney. The three films are last year's The Good Dinosaur, Tangled and, of course, the monster hit Frozen, which generated over $400 million domestically and yet didn't top the weekend box office until its second weekend in wide release. This weekend Disney looks to add another film to the Thanksgiving all-time charts in the form of Moana, a CGI-animated feature set amongst the islands of Oceania, arriving in over 3,800 theaters and this one will finish at #1.

Additional new releases include the Brad Pitt and Marion Cotillard World War II thriller Allied, Broad Green's release of Bad Santa 2 and Fox's Rules Don't Apply, the first film directed by Warren Beatty since 1998's Bulworth. All will be competing for a spot in the top ten against the second weekend of Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them and the continued top ten performances from Doctor Strange and Trolls. It's an extended weekend where 99% of children are out of school on Thursday and Friday and it should be a strong weekend at the box office.

Set for an easy #1 finish, Disney's Moana has all the right ingredients including a voice cast led by Dwayne Johnson, the directors of The Little Mermaid and Aladdin (Ron Clements and John Musker) and the team behind the film's music is led by Tony®- and Grammy®-winning lyricist/composer Lin-Manuel Miranda ("Hamilton"). Question is to wonder just what kind of box office success these ingredients are able to cook up.

Online ticket-retailer Fandango.com reports the film is outpacing Zootopia at the same point in the company's sales cycle. This does come with the caveat that Zootopia wasn't a Wednesday opener, but to take the comparison a bit further, IMDb page view data shows Moana pacing just a bit behind Zootopia when adjusting for the Wednesday opening. At the same time, a recent spike over the last couple days has bumped it up into competition with Frozen which, remember, played in one theater for one week ahead of release where it joined fellow Disney animated features with one of the top opening weekend theater averages of all-time. Moana isn't getting a similar week's worth of early buzz, but it will have Tuesday night preview screenings before it begins playing in 3,875 theaters on Wednesday with ~80% of those locations offering the film in 3D as well as 50 PLF screens and more than 40 DBOX screens.

As far as how it will perform, Disney is estimating a $70 million five-day haul. Given what we're looking at, the film's 100% RottenTomatoes rating and score of 82 on Metacritic, Mojo is forecasting a bit higher, anticipating a three-day around $62 million and a five-day around $85 million with a chance at a possible $90+ million five-day, which would put it in the same league as Frozen's $93.5 million five-day performance back in 2013.

Looking at a second place finish is last weekend's new opener Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, which wasn't able to live up to Mojo's lofty forecast, but did deliver upon industry expectations coming in just shy of a $75 million opening. For comparison we can look at previous Thanksgiving second weekends such as how Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone dropped 36% after a $90 million opening back in 2001 and how The Hunger Games: Mockingjay - Part 2 dropped 49.3% just last year after a $102.6 million opening. While this only presents us with a limited set of data for comparison it does provide a decent range for expectation. A good assumption would be to lean a little more toward the more recent case study and expect a drop around 45% and a $41 million three-day and upwards of $58 million for the five-day holiday.

Heroes Forever: The New Beginning is trailing down to a easily third place with another $25 million for three-day weekend, and $32 million for five-day weekend, which should pass the $250 million mark domestically, while fourth place will go to Paramount's Allied from director Robert Zemeckis and starring Brad Pitt and Marion Cotillard. The film was made on an $85 million budget and is debuting in 3,160 theaters on Wednesday with the studio anticipating a five-day opening in the high-teens, which feels incredibly safe, similar to the studio's expected $15 million opening for Arrival a few weeks ago before it debuted to $24 million.

Looking at IMDb data in advance of release Allied is tracking incredibly close to Bridge of Spies, which opened with $15 million over a three-day weekend in October, and pacing ahead of Argo, another October opener that debuted with $19.4 million over three-days. Reviews for the film have been mixed to the point it currently holds a 62% rating on RottenTomatoes, which won't exactly get audiences in theaters, but it isn't so bad it will turn many away. Overall, a five-day weekend around $25 million seems like safe territory, but it wouldn't be too surprising if it was able to threaten $30 million. It looks like it will be neck-to-neck challenge for both Heroes and Allied for a tough top three charts.

It will be a tough battle Trolls and Doctor Strange, for one of them to round the top five, though the fact this is more of a family holiday Trolls could have a slight edge if it doesn't lose too much audience to Moana.

Broad Green Pictures and Miramax's Bad Santa 2 is looking at a finish just outside the top five as it is set to debut in 2,500-2,800 locations, which makes forecasting a bit more difficult. Industry expectations for the $26 million feature is a five-day opening in the mid-teens, which is about right on par with the average for a film of this sort. We could be looking at anything in the range of $12-17 million for the five-day. Attempting to draw comparisons using IMDb data shows the film pacing behind films such as Horrible Bosses 2 ($15.4m opening), Zoolander 2 ($13.8m opening) and even Hot Tub Time Machine 2 ($5.9m opening). Comedy sequels are tricky in that most don't generate the kind of fanbase that demands more and in this case Bad Santa 2 is showing the initial signs of being another one of those films to the point a $13 million five-day opening appears to be a best case scenario.

The last of the weekend's new wide releases is Fox's Rules Don't Apply, debuting in ~2,300 theaters. With very little fanfare leading up to release, there isn't much reason to expect this one to perform much higher than $5 million or so for the five-day weekend.

This weekend will also feature the continued expansion of Loving into 421 theaters (+284) and Focus's Nocturnal Animals expands into 126 theaters (+89).

In limited release starting on Friday, November 25, The Weinstein Co. will debut Lion in four theaters, IFC will release Evolution into three theaters and EuropaCorp will release Miss Sloane into three theaters.

In terms of the weekend overall, Mojo is anticipating the top twelve will gross nearly $185 million for the three-day, an ~5% improvement over the same weekend last year. This weekend's forecast is directly below. This post will be updated with additional information as it comes available, including official theater counts, Tuesday night preview results and updates leading to Friday estimates on Saturday morning followed by a complete weekend recap Sunday morning.

3-DAY FORECAST *Moana - $62.0 M *Fantastic Beasts and Where To Find Them - $41.0 M *Heroes Forever: The New Beginning - $25.2 M *Allied - $18 M *Trolls - $13.8 M *Doctor Strange - $13.1 M *Bad Santa 2 - $9.2 M *Arrival - $7.9 M *Hacksaw Ridge - $4.9 M *Almost Christmas - $4.8 M

5-DAY FORECAST *Moana - $85 M *Fantastic Beasts and Where To Find Them - $58 M *Heroes Forever: The New Beginning - $32 M *Allied - $25 M *Trolls - $19.1 M *Doctor Strange - $18.2 M *Bad Santa 2 - $13 M *Arrival - $10.8 M *Hacksaw Ridge - $6.7 M *Almost Christmas - $6.4 M