Energized By The Franchise

Here's more on Halloween's Labor Day weekend victory--including final numbers.



Pamela McClintock of Variety, not only talks Halloween, but also looks back at Summer '07 as a whole:

Dimension's "Halloween" proved the perfect ending to the record-busting summer, grossing a winning $31 million over the Labor Day weekend and joining the parade of franchises --new and old -- that fueled the unexpected box office boom.

Generally, the Labor Day frame is ho-hum for movie-going. Not so this year, in keeping with the summer-long trend that defied the odds to become the best on the books for the film biz, the four-day Labor Day weekend included.

Domestic box office is up 8% over summer 2004, the previous record frame, and up 11% over last year, according to Nielsen EDI and Rentrak. Overseas, Hollywood fare positively glowed, with the international box office up 20% over last year's summer haul.

For the first time, the domestic summer box office crossed the $4 billion mark. Through Monday, box office receipts totaled an estimated $4.152 billion, compared with $3.860 billion in 2004 and $3.739 billion last year.

The big question now: Will Hollywood be able to replicate the summer of 2007, when business never let up, even in the dog days of August?This year's busy sesh marked the first time that the four mega-franchises -- Sony's "Spider-Man," Disney's "Pirates of the Caribbean," DreamWorks Animation's "Shrek" and Warner Bros.' "Harry Potter" -- all made a stand at the B.O. during the same summer, along with franchise installments "The Bourne Ultimatum," "Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer" and "Ocean's Thirteen."

Moreover, the summer bounty was enhanced by successful revival of long-dormant properties "Die Hard" and "Rush Hour," as well as the bigscreen adaptation of celebrated television series "The Simpsons." Summer 2007 also saw the birth of a new franchise with the boffo perf of robot actioner "Transformers."

The one franchise title unable to make a strong play was laffer "Evan Almighty." Otherwise, though, comedy was a top draw this summer, especially R-rated fare a la Judd Apatow's "Knocked Up" and the Apatow-produced "Superbad."

"Evan" was billed less as a sequel than as a reimagining. Unlike "Evan," Rob Zombie's reimagining of the durable horror franchise "Halloween" hit the sweet spot this weekend.

Distributed by MGM and playing in 3,472 locations, the ninth pic in the horror franchise nabbed the biggest opening ever for the holiday and overturned recent talk that horror is no longer a box office draw. Previous record holder for Labor Day was "Transporter 2," which debuted at $20.1 million in 2005...

Find the entire article here

McClintock also has a great companion article on the summer that was--to be found here

Nicole Sperling of Entertainment Weekly:

Rob Zombie's horror flick sets a new Labor Day mark on its way to No. 1..