Daniel Craig in SPECTRE’s main titles
Answer: Not much in the big scheme of things.
It’s one thing for 007 fan message boards to discuss (even obsess) over the subject of SPECTRE’s box office in the U.S. and Canada. But when a major entertainment website like TheWrap (which we read regularly and usually enjoy) DOES SO, well it’s time to take a deep breath.
Here’s an excerpt from TheWrap’s Feb. 25 story:
The latest James Bond movie, “Spectre,” should cross $200 million in domestic box-office on Thursday.
It’s taken the suave spy nearly four months to get there, and Sony raised the theater count from 47 to 340 last weekend to make sure it did.
Except, it didn’t.
Through Friday, Feb. 26 (when the screen count dipped to 92 from the aforementioned 340), the 24th James Bond film had a cumulative U.S.-Canada box office of $199,829,527, according to the Box Office Mojo website. The movie’s global box office has topped out at around $879.5 million.
SPECTRE generated $5,000 in ticket sales in the U.S. and Canada on Friday. At that rate, it will be only a little more than a month before SPECTRE crosses the $200 million mark for the region — while the movie is also available on home video.
TheWrap story did, however, address an issue that has more long-term importance — when will Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer select a studio partner to release Bond 25?
The contract of Sony Pictures, which has release 007 movies since 2006, expires with SPECTRE. MGM has to decide whether to re-up with Sony or select a new partner. MGM, after a 2010 bankruptcy, doesn’t have a distribution arm.
The Wrap, though, didn’t add much new. MGM either has received “or will soon… a pitch from every Hollywood studio, including Sony Pictures, the current rights-holder,” The Wrap said.
Essentially, not much about Bond 25 can happen until MGM makes its choice. You can’t release a movie if there’s nobody to release it.
UPDATE: The estimated U.S.-Canadian box office for SPECTRE for the Feb. 26-28 weekend is $16,000, according to BOX OFFICE MOJO. That place it at No. 45, with a cumulative box office in the region of $199,840,527.
Filed under: James Bond Films | Tagged: Bond 25, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, Sony Pictures, SPECTRE, TheWrap |
The Spy Command 
Isn’t it all a bit academic? Who cares really who distributes it – although Sony have launched some rather nice phones tied into Bond over the past few years – if the films are as poor as Spectre? Even many of its biggest fans start their comments with “I know the third act was poor, but…” I’d rather they took their time with the story rather than obsessing about the numbers and then rushing something shoddy out in a hurry.