For the first time in history, an actual honest-to-goodness movie will not be number one at the box office. The same phenomenon that sent parents scrambling over themselves to spend hundreds of dollars on the E-Bay equivalent of ticket scalping is now infesting the cinema. The name of this entertainment anamoly? Hannah Montana.
Estimates are in for yesterday's ticket sales and the 3D film version of the "Hannah Montana/Miley Cyrus: Best of Both Worlds Concert Tour" is sitting pretty. Best of both worlds is right. Not only has the live concert event been a craze of success, the film version is raking in the cash hand over fist. With an opening day take of $8.5 million in less than 700 theaters, it smashed runner up The Eye which didn't quite clear the $5 million mark and was showing on nearly four times as many screens. Despite the Super Bowl likely slowing things down on Sunday, Hannah and company may just bust the $30 million mark for the weekend.
Part of what's driving the rush to the theaters is the good old principle of supply and demand. The movie is slated to run this week only, though it wouldn't be surprising if this level of success lead to a slightly extended run. After all, even Disney (the studio behind the Hannah Montana TV series) isn't usually in the business of turning down cash. That's not to say that the actress is in it just for the money. I have no doubt her heart is in the right place. She probably just wants to give as many fans a chance to see the concert as possible. But you can bet Disney is taking this as a chance to sell extra tickets without having to pay for all the venue expenses. And why not? It's not every concert that's going to pack audiences into a movie theater for a full week run. Maybe if Cher gave another farewell show?
The comfort in the midst of this madness might be that U2's recently released concert-on-film out performed Hannah Montana when compared at the per theater level. Last weekend when it debuted in only 61 theaters it pulled in a solid $15,000+ per theater total. Hannah Montana is sitting at $12,000+. I don't wish Miley any ill will, but given U2's musical legendary status it's nice to see them stay atop of the flavor-of-the-month teen performer.
