Bulgarian Boxoffice Update - Weekend 5-7 August

(or what's hot and what's not in the peculiar world of the Bulgarian cinemas)

(Off Topic!!! - In a curious twist in distribution policy, Universal's "The Change-Up" will actually see the light of Bulgaria's cinema halls, hopefully Bridesmaids will be next)

No one's gonna stop me from conquering the BG boxoffice

Though far from the boxoffice success in the USA, the Bulgarian audience also brought the rather brilliant The Rise of The Planet of The Apes to the number one slot in the country. The result of above BGN 48,000 is unspectacular but unsurprising as The Rise of The Planet of The Apes is actually a movie with zero star power, tough premise for a sale to the always picky BG viewers and worst of all comes in no 3D. Still, in view of the past achievements of the distributor, expect the film to have good legs over the next weeks.

Losing some 48% of its super powers, Captain America retreats to #2 this weekend, with a total of BGN 207,954 so far, while, just to prove for yet another time that cinema goers prefer comedies to escape from the tough BG reality (yes, I'm a little bit ironic today), Friends With Benefits falls by mere 24% and has BGN 127,920 in its account so far.

Slowing down on its downward path, Harry Potter decreased by 38% and now can congratulate itself with a total of BGN 664,888. 

At #5 Cars 2 even rises by 9% and boasts BGN 606,145 so far, cementing further its status as the most successful Pixar movie in the country. It is followed by fellow Disney production, Winnie The Pooh, which has earned BGN 129,098 - a great achievement for the title's distributor in Bulgaria. 

At #7 Transformers 3 has finally crossed the BGN 1m barrier, becoming by far the biggest Paramount hit in the newest Bulgarian cinema history. 

A position behind, Bad Teacher is steadily marching towards the BGN 500,000 mark, with BGN 419,167 so far, while The Hangover 2 stands at #9 with BGN 683,326 in its bottle. The top ten is wrapped up by Pirates 4, with the blockbuster having BGN 2,036,794 in Bulgaria so far.

This week Mr. Popper's Penguins says its farewell to the top 10 in its sixth week on the chart. The family movie has collected BGN 151,259 so far - a "so so" result for a Jim Carrey vehicle.

Compared to my last week projections, The Rise Of The Planet Of The Apes came with BGN 30,000 below my forecast of BGN 80,000.

Next weekend's projections:

Cowboys and Aliens - BGN 100,000, including previews 

(BGN 1 = USD 0.74 = EUR 0.51)