'Wolverine' Could Sink Its Claws Into $100M

But New Line will try to lure the ladies away from Hugh Jackman's "X-Men" prequel this weekend with “Ghost of Girlfriends Past."

From: thewrap.com
Written by: Lauren Horwitch.

It’ll take more than a swine flu scare to keep audiences away from “X-Men Origins: Wolverine,” opening in 4,000 theaters this weekend.

The Fox prequel -- the first in a coming onslaught of summer tentpoles including “Star Trek” (May 8) and “Angels and Demons” (May 15) -- is a shoo-in for No. 1. The question is, how big will it be?

According to Marketcast tracking data published in Ad Age last week, “Wolverine” is on track to hit $100 million this weekend, which would make it the biggest opening of 2009 so far. This year's current box-office champion is "Fast & Furious" which opened on April 5 with $72.5 million.

Fandango says that by 5 p.m. Wednesday, 65 percent of its ticket sales were “Wolverine,” and Movietickets.com reported Wednesday afternoon that 200 screenings of “Wolverine” already had sold out -- over a quarter of which are for midnight shows on Thursday.

By comparison, Marketcast predicted “Trek” will open with about $50 million.

Indeed, $100 million doesn’t seem unreasonable, considering 2006’s “X-Men: the Last Stand” made $123 million on its opening four-day weekend and “X2” scored 85.6 million in 2003. The three previous “X-Men” films have made more than $1.16 billion worldwide. Fox is already developing an “origins” prequel about Ian McKellen’s character Magneto and other X-Men.

Still, Fox senior VP and general sales manager Chris Aronson is hedging his bets -- he told TheWrap that the studio doesn’t think “Wolverine” will hit $100 million. “That’s not what we’re expecting in a million years,” he said. “If we can gross $70 million or over, it would be fantastic. The expectation bar has to be set at a realistic place. It’s a spin-off of a movie that’s been sequelized twice.”

Marketcast’s report indicated that women under 24 could be a key factor in “Wolverine’s” success -- 38 percent of women in that age group said they have a “definite interest” in seeing Jackman as Wolverine for the fourth time, while only 18 percent expressed interest in seeing “Trek.”

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Superbowl Movie Trailers Revealed!

From: Cinematical.com

Unlike last year's poor showing, the Hollywood studios are bringing out the big guns for this year's Superbowl. What that means is our first look at Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, as it seems Paramount will be holding out for that Superbowl launch. Other much-anticipated trailers arriving that Sunday include G.I. Joe, Angels and Demons, Monsters vs. Aliens(the 3-D version, which requires special glasses, will air at the end of the second quarter), Land of the Lost and Fast and Furious, with spots for Pixar's Up and X-Men Origins: Wolverine also likely. Damn.

Last year I believe a couple trailers leaked prior the the big game, but all of them were available online immediately afterwards. No word on whether any of these trailers will arrive online beforehand to soak up a little internet spotlight before having to share the main stage on Superbowl Sunday. Additionally, according to Variety, some studios -- like Warner Brothers, Fox and Disney -- still haven't bought air time, but may wait until the last minute to snag a spot at a lower price. Warners, for example, has Watchmen, Terminator: Salvation and Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince on the agenda, and we'd be surprised if none of those snuck in a little game day treat.

Which trailer are you most excited to see?