The weekend actuals are in and, as we suspected yesterday, King Kong beat Narnia over the weekend by a little more than $18 million. (Although it's worth noting that, in a rare moment of candor, Universal's Sunday morning estimate was almost dead-on with Kong's actual total. How can they guess that close without the Sunday numbers even have happened yet? They have rooms full of math scientists using test tubes and slide-rules.)
If you've followed the saga of Narnia watch, you'll remember that Hugh Hewitt was quick to gloat after Narnia's opening weekend, but has been silent on the subject in recent days now that the dream of a Narnia over Kong second weekend has died.
Anyway, this was such a wildly unfair bet that I feel a little guilty even bringing it up. And I certainly don't expect any fabulous prizes. (Although what self-respecting runner wouldn't want a Hugh Hewitt Running Club t-shirt?)
1 day ago
12 comments:
Wow, Jonathan! You are absolutely the smartest most knowledgeable person in the whole world! Gosh, we are all really impressed down here on planet Earth.
Keep up the great work.
Love,
All of your devoted fans
Enough with the Hewitt bashing. At least he has some class. Jealous?
But Jonathan, Narnia still beat Kong if you look at the opening weekends for each movie. The article linked from boxofficemojo.com stated that Kong was the fourth biggest December opening weekend behind: the last two Lord of the Rings and Narnia. If that article is correct, I think you are fudging a bit.
I am anon 10:36. I reread the original Narnia post and this is what it said:
Hugh Hewitt is betting that The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe will beat King Kong both in total box office and--amazingly--on the weekend when Kong opens. I'd take that bet.
Bottom line, JVL wins the second part of the bet: that Narnia won't beat Kong on the weekend of the 17th and 18th of Decemeber. Now that is a easy money. However, Narnia did have a better opening weekend than Kong. We shall see in 6 months about overall box office $.
Enough of this unpleasantness!
Let's all agree to return to making fun of Brokeback Mountain and offering crude double entendres regarding same.
United We Stand!
What the hell is going on here? Guess I've got to cancel High Tea with the Queen; somebody's gotta stand up for my boy here.
Anon 9.33: Here's an idea. If JVL's being, ya know, right bothers you so much, why don't you turn off the computer and go take a shower? Because nothin' screams "WINNER" like being pissed at someone for being, ya know, right.
Anon 10.20: Yeah, Hugh's been nothing but class lately. That whole dustup over Harriet Miers? Pure class. Especially when he decided to mercilessly dump on each and every conservative who opposed her. Pure class, calling Krauthammer and Kristol and Will and Frum a bunch of hacks. Pure class.
(How'd that turn out, by the way?)
Anon 10:36/11:31: You were right to go back to the original post. But the entire line of reasoning suggests--and JVL explicitly states--that he was comparing the grosses from Kong's opening weekend. Hewitt, fresh from predicting that tens of millions would line up to watch The Great Raid, proclaimed with metaphysical certitude that Narnia would outperform Kong on Kong's opener. JVL just ran the numbers, and said it was pretty much impossible. And JVL was right.
Anon 2:05: I thought you quit blogging to finish up your book--the Soul of Conservatism, no? Without a fundraiser this time? What about all that bandwidth?
Hey 4:06 -
You posted:
Anon 9.33: Here's an idea. If JVL's being, ya know, right bothers you so much, why don't you turn off the computer and go take a shower? Because nothin' screams "WINNER" like being pissed at someone for being, ya know, right.
I could give a shit that he is right. But the self congratulation is a bit much but entirely within JVL's character. He is soooooo impressed with how smart he is.
I am sorry that you did not understand the post, but it is quite understandable after reading your post.
PS - Wipe off your chin.
Just in. Narnia beat King Kong on Wednesday December 21, 2005.
1. The Chronicles of Narnia $4,940,386
2. King Kong $4,870,320
I was just going to post that Narnia beat Kong on 12/21. My kids are on Christmas vacation and all the 5th graders went to Narnia - 35 kids. I can't image an entire class of kids planning to go together to Kong (most will probably go individually).
For the second day, Narnia beat Kong.
Thursday 12/22 on Boxofficemojo.
Narnia: $5,763,097
Kong: $5,575,000
Wow, they are barely apart. What a fight!!!
Visit Drudgereport who is tracking this.
King Kong won back the crown, but it is within $1 to 2 million.
It is pretty close considering that King Kong came out one week later.
Domestics as of 1 Jan, 2006:
Narnia: 280,513,000
Kong: 201,651,000
Just sayin'.
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