This Memorial Day weekend known in Canada as “the weekend” (we had our holiday the previous weekend – Victoria Day) was a battle of the sequels with Terminator Salvation hoping to hold the weekend. Seems that the sequel Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian hedged out the Terminator sequel despite Terminator’s extra day.
From Thursday to Monday, Terminator has only managed $67 million. So now, even with a one day head start, it couldn’t do the kind of business Night at the Museum generated. Yep: $70 million in four days for Museum versus $67 million in five days for T4.
Now while some might see this as a defeat for Terminator, I don’t. With such poor reviews for the film buzzing around the net (not just here) I was surprised to see this hit at $67million. Remember that the much more hotly pursued Star Trek brought in an impressive $75m on its first week out, and finding a bad review for that movie was difficult.
In my books, this was as much of a win as we could hope for. Even in interviews McG has been saying that his three film plan will be completely dependent on the fans seeing this movie. No truer words were spoken. If they can’t make this a financial success, we likely wont see more Terminator stories. At least not with McG at the head.
But also folks, remember the squash.
NEVER underestimate the power of a family friendly film. I knew that no matter HOW big Terminator looked, it just wasn’t likely to out number the masses lining up for Battle at the Smithsonian. Seriously, they had Vader, a slap happy monkey and Amy Adams.
For those who think that Terminator would have done better if those families were not dragging their kids out on the holiday weekend, next weekend isn’t looking good either. Disney’s Up! is coming out.
to be honest with u, i was so damn excited to watch this movie, but terminator not onnly has it failed as franchise but also failed to be just a good movie,
IT WAS DISAPOINTING !!!!!!!!! for me !!
NEVER FORGET THE SQUASH.
NEVER.
So, I goofed in my prediction that T.S. would hit $80 Mil. I completely overlooked NATM coming out. Still, $67 Mil is a fantastic number for the weekend, considering the overblown Bale fiasco (like he’s the only one that’s thrown a tantrum) and the critical reviews being weak. In my eyes, it was succesful. Not as succesful as it could’ve been, but it still did impressively well considering two new movies came out the same weekend.
There’s a question for ya: when T3 came out, what else came out that weekend?
“remember the squash”
That made me smile
I can understand. For one thing, remember the squash man. Family films should not be underestimated. Plus, you gotta remember, a lot of people didn’t like T3 (I personally thought it was okay), so they probably expected the same from this film.
Hey Rodney, where’s your review for Night At the Museum?
I haven’t seen it, so I can’t review it! lol
Should John or I get around to it, we will put one up.
Maybe they should’ve had a Terminator in Night At The Museum…. I haven’t been to the Mall in many years but since we had another movie villain (don’t want to spoil it although I think it was mentioned earlier in the blog), it would have made a good inside joke… I’m sure they keep a big Terminator figure somewhere in the vaults of the Mall…
In any case. Terminator was odd and patchy but I had a good laugh at the Machine guarding the Humans….Why does a Machine need to wear head gear? I still laugh about it now….ridiculous….
Drum roll and cymbal splash please….here comes the Turbanator !!!
Rodney, you’re forgetting that this franchise is independently owned; WB put up 60 mill and Sony put up 100 mill – the two owners put up the rest, and are taking in 50% of the profits. They’ll definitely make another; the only question is with who.
You are forgetting that if this movie doesn’t make any money its unlikely a sequel in the same vein regardless of who is in the directors seat.
Studios only care about the money. If there is no money, there is no film.
Remember the Narnia series? Disney did two of those, and decided it wasn’t worth the risk. And they handed off the third to someone else to risk it.
It doesn’t matter that there COULD be another movie, its all about the money.
All I see that meaning is that whoever Halycon decides to venture the next one with will put up less money – which won’t necessarily be a bad thing. The main problem most people have with TS is that there was too much action and not enough attention paid to the story. Scaling back on the action could actually be a good idea.
Also, even after adjusting for inflation this is the biggest a terminator movie has opened
T2 = 31 mil adjusted to 48
T3 = 44 mil adjusted to 51
I actually quite like TERMINATOR…, even more than I enjoyed STAR TREK
Here’s the deal: yes, STAR TREK is a better movie than TERMINATOR SALVATION, but as I said above, there was so much hype for …TREK that there was no way it could live up to the hype in my eyes, and it didn’t. Likewise, I was expecting a complete FAIL for TERMINATOR…, so when it didn’t I was pleasantly surprised.
Also, let’s consider this: when I see a Star Trek movie I expect a somewhat serious, cerebral bit of science fiction. Yes, I love the action, but Trek has always been a fairly straightforward attempt to show man reaching for that ultimate potential as we explore the stars; it’s supposed to be what is best about us.
The Terminator series has always been somewhat ridiculous, and yes, even the two Cameron films. Sending a robot back in time to kill the mother of the man that is going to lead the resistance? Sure, it sounds good on paper, but why send just one robot? Why not send a whole mess of them? Or send the robots even further back into time when there are weapons that can hurt them and kill the family tree then?
OK, maybe they can’t, but if the robots DO kill John Connor in the past then theResistance will never have their strong leader, meaning they won’t turn the tide of the war to their side and as such Skynet will never send a Terminator back in time, thus creating a paradox. So, really, Skynet and the Terminators CAN’T win in the past.
Was it just coincidence that Resistance sent the same exact make/model back in time to protect John Connor in T2 that was sent back in T1? Talk about an oops, so much so that Skynet took advantage of that fact and used the same model to kill him in T3 (which was later reprogrammed by his wife to again be good).
Ridiculous.
OK, machines, anything non-living, can’t go back in time, unless it is covered in something living, and yet Skynet couldn’t figure out how to conceal a plasma rifle within a T-600 for the trip back in time?
Ridiculous.
And why do the Terminators punch when unarmed? Why not just grab a limb/throat/whatever and squeeze it until it gives? All human vs. Terminator in hand-to-hand combat fights should always be over in about five seconds.
But they’re not.
Why?
Because Terminator has ALWAYS been ridiculous; it’s a ridiculous concept and the movies are ridiculous. Even the name is ridiculous.
But that doesn’t mean that they can’t be fun.
And that is why I enjoyed TERMINATOR SALVATION more than STAR TREK: I wasn’t expecting good plot and character development. All I required was good action, lots of explosions, and robots fucking shit up, and I got all of that.
Are there weaknesses to the movie?
Hell yeah, lots of them, but when it comes down to it really the Terminator franchise is THE FAST AND THE FURIOUS of science-fiction: it really doesn’t take itself too seriously and we get to see cool stuff ‘asplode!
Terminator films are popcorn, candy bars, junk food for the eyes whereas Star Trek is, or should be, more of a full course meal. Last night I was just looking for a candy bar.
In short, STAR TREK is the better movie, but I simply enjoyed TERMINATOR SALVATION more because it was nothing more than the popcorn flick that I wanted. Check your mind at the door and have a good time.
I did.
I saw both and Smithsonian sucked bad. Terminator was like two movies, the 2nd half had me interested as soon as They got to the matrix, er, Cyberdyne but the plot really didn’t make sense. So why did they need all the humans again? How did Cyberdyne know Kyle Reese was Connors dad? well, at least the action scenes kicked ass and used little “shaky cam”.
With the releases of UP and Drag Me To Hell (something I think will be pretty big) where do you guys think T4 will fall? No doubt UP will be number one this weekend
I see Up being in the number 1 spot for at least 2-3 weeks. Drag Me To Hell in #3, Night at the Museum in #2 still and Terminator maybe in 4?
Let’s take bets…..
I actually think T4 will hold as all the kiddies will have seen Night At The Museum by next week so:
01. Up
02. Drag Me To Hell (I hope..)
03. T4
04. NIght At The Museum
Although I’m not sure how much people want to see a horror at the moment….. I personally can’t wait…. It looks like a lot of fun !
Horror fans are always horror fans.
That being said I honestly dont think T4 will be higher than Night at the Museum. Families will be at the theater in droves for UP and if they can’t get in, they wont turn to Terminator.
My prediction is that Terminator will be lucky to hit third spot this coming weekend. Especially with all the bad buzz going on.
Like rodney said, never underestimate the power of the kids movie man. I personally see Drag Me To Hell doing ok in numbers even if it opens at #3. Raimi has a great ability to make indie films for little money. I’m sure if Drag me opens at #3 it will still be a decent amount of money to break even and/or make profit.
Well…..At least we all agree on Up….it will take a ginormous wave of viewers both old and young….
I am not a horror movie fan per say…more like a horror comedy fan …and Sam Raimi is the best at that.
I would love to see a cult movie hit second place..
In any case, I do believe Terminator might do just as well as Night At The Museum by now…those who wanted to see it saw it (me being one of them) and what can I say….a rental would’ve done just fine….it wasn’t as good as the first…maybe because I loved Mickey Rooney in the first one so much ! Comedy genius…
Damn with only 67 million, it wont likely recoup its 200 million reported budget! Hopefully it’ll have international appeal. I bet the movie will fade quickly like ‘Watchmen’.
Doub that it will fade like Watchmen, it’s Terminator, nuff said
I REALLY liked the film at first, but after discussing it w/ some fans I chose to lower my rating, and but as far as more films are concerned….just end the series.
I still haven’t seen terminator. From the get go, my gut was telling me this movie wasn’t going to be very good though. I don’t normally pay attention to reviews but I’m going to eventually see it to satisfy my curiosity.
I can’t wait to see Up. It’s gonna be great.
Goes to show that bad filmmaking can bring such an epic franchise like Terminator down on it’s knees in front of Night At The Museum. Nice going McG! Such a good base for a great story to be told and he blew it. Flat out blew it!
Its hardly “on its knees”. It nearly made as much as Star Trek did in its opening weekend.
It wont KEEP making that money, but it was a respectable showing considering the bad reviews it was getting and a big family film against it.
Yeah, I know it wasn’t down on it’s knees, I’m exagerating. Thanks for calling me out though. But I’m just passionately upset at the execution of the film. The material was layed out right in front of them. The look & feel of the film was ahead of it’s time in ’84 and is still relevant now. The actors were there, set design, etc. It’s sad to see such a great story get lost.
man is am sooooooooo happy right now t4 was number 2 like i said it over over. it was not going to be number 1. to kevin the movie was pretty weak and it deserves to get those poor reviews.
This is one Good Movie , Terminator 4 . Why all those poor f*cking reviews, it deserves better.
yeah it has a lot of explosions
If it deserved better, it would have got better.
Sorry. You can disagree with the reviews but many of them don’t agree with you.
I am glad you found enjoyment in it. It deserves nothing more than it earns.
Not counting critics, and going only by Fan Sites like this one, as those are the only reviews and opinions I pay any attention to, I’ve seen more positive reviews for Terminator then I have negative, and outside of the Net I haven’t met a single person that saw it and didn’t like it.
I agree with Slushie Man here. Also, and I am repeating myself from a comment in a different post, but ticket sales does not equal good movie. This comment is in reference to “If it deserved better, it would have got better.” This statement is simply not true, it way too easy to prove incorrect, and I shouldn’t even need to begin to explain it to anyone who actually has a respect for movies.
Let’s also put it this way. If a movie that makes a lot of money must be good, then what’s the point of marketing? Under this direct correlation between movie sales and movie quality, clearly the movie’s performance is solely based on it’s quality. Why do I need to spend millions on trailers and ads? The movie is great, so it’ll obviously sell well. And while we get to use this ridiculous correlation, we also never need to make top ten lists any more. We just need to list movies in order of the money they’ve made, and clearly the best movies humanity has to offer will be those that made the most money.
I pray you can see the absurdity of what I portrayed above. It shouldn’t need much more explaining than that.
Reviews don’t really matter to the audiences anymore, especially for big budget action flicks. Check the rottentomatoe score for all the top 10 movies, and see how low they all are.
Terminator Salvation didn’t do that badly if you take in the whole 5 days into account. It did lose everyday from Friday to Monday to Night at the Museum. This is the first Terminator without the R rating, and it made less than R-rated T3 did in its opening weekend. However with the weaker word of mouth and heavy competition in upcoming weeks, I don’t even expect this movie to make near the amount T3 does in the final domestic gross. I do think T:S could have an amazing foreign gross.
Yet most people agree on the quality and appeal of the highest rated films on their site.
Works both ways.
Just sayin.
Rodney,
that isn’t true. Action audiences don’t care about reviews!!!!! lots of times critics and regular audiences disagree. Also, opening weekends aren’t affected by critics. Night at the Museum didn’t have many stellar reviews either, and it was number 1 this weekend.
Terminator Salvation lost to Smithsonian for other reasons than bad reviews. It could be a lost of interest in this franchise, or the lack of Arnold.
@Dax
I was chatting with a family member about the Terminator franchise is she’s rather reluctant to see it because of no Arnold. She said, “When I think Terminator, I think Arnold. Without him it really isn’t Terminator.”
But there is Arnold. Briefly.
Arnold’s face from 1984 makes a cameo, which is the highlight of the film for me. Though, the nonspeaking five minute cameo might not be enough to draw people in who consider Schwarzenegger the reason the other films worked. At least that’s what I’m inferring from friends and family.
Word of mouth retains it’s use! After checking with this site and other reviews for Terminator, I put it on the backburner as a top movie I have to see right away and is now delegated to one I’ll just see when it comes out DVD. The post picture looks funny though for this article.
It’s got a lot of action and effects, but a bad plot, go figure
I’m shocked quite frankly, guess word of mouth got out. Good article Rodney, I really didn’t think that NATM would beat Terminator, but who knew.
Btw UP will be major, and i am looking forward to it