There are plenty of us who might wish it otherwise, but on the basis of results so far in the UK, comedy spoof Vampires Suck represents sound business sense for backers 20th Century Fox. The UK opening for The Social Network is even marginally ahead of expectations generated by its US debut ($22.4m), going by the 10% rule that suggests a UK gross in sterling should be one tenth the number generated in dollars in North America. Such is the individual nature of the movie, appropriate box-office comparisons are hard to make, although it's worth noting that Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps – a sequel (albeit a belated one) benefiting from a built-in audience – debuted the previous weekend with £1.78m, including previews of £583,000. Still, the opening number must be beyond the top end of expectations that existed when Sony embarked on this project, a talky drama about computer programming, business and litigation, starring Jesse Eisenberg, Andrew Garfield and Justin Timberlake. Thanks to Despicable Me, David Fincher's Facebook story has had to settle for second place. In any of the previous seven weekends, the £2.49m (including £383,000 in previews) grossed by The Social Network would have been sufficient to land the top spot at the UK box office. But, says Kosse, "We are anticipating a very long, robust run, because that's what we've experienced in every other country so far, a six or seven multiple of the opening weekend in a lot of places." Crucially, the whole lucrative October half-term holiday is ahead of it, although competition for that huge family audience arrives in several directions, notably from Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga'Hoole.
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"We're very proud that this is the first movie to come out of this company." Universal's 2008 animated effort The Tale of Despereaux (UK lifetime gross, £2.54m), developed before the creation of Illumination, can now be well and truly forgotten.ĭespicable Me opened at the UK at the weekend with £3.66m including £205,000 in previews: not exactly in the same league as Toy Story 3, or even Up, which debuted a year ago with £6.41m.
"It's a huge breakthrough for us," he says.
Founded and led by former 20th Century Fox Animation president Chris Meledandri, Illumination has hit the ball out of the park on its first swing at the bat, with a film that has already grossed $400m worldwide and is headed – says Universal's international president David Kosse, who ought to know – for at least $500m. The company can only have gazed with envy at the likes of 20th Century Fox (Ice Age) and Warner Bros (Happy Feet), to say nothing, of course, of market leaders Disney/Pixar and the Paramount-distributed DreamWorks Animation.īut that's all changed, and in impressive style, with Despicable Me, the first film from Illumination Entertainment, which is co-owned and exclusively distributed by Universal. While every major studio has developed either a successful animation division or a distribution relationship with a successful animation producer, for years, Universal has taken up the rear in this field.
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