Looks like Michael Bay's TRANSFORMERS: AGE OF EXTINCTION will be the first movie of the year to break the $100M opening barrier. Tracking is through the roof for the $165M budgeted movie and we all know Mark Wahlberg is solid in bringing in the numbers.
Note that the run time of the movie is nearly 3 hours which will limit screenings somewhat though AVATAR was also in the same ball park and that didn't seem to be affected ;-) Further, no other movies are opening this weekend. We will definitely see the impact of the Chinese market with this release as it was a joint production, marketing will be strong, and Chinese actors and skylines are involved. In fact I wouldn't be surprised if the numbers from China rival or even surpass domestic. We'll have a better idea tomorrow night.
Speaking of domestic box office, TRANSFORMERS: AGE OF EXTINCTION opens in 4200 theaters (353 in IMAX 3D) and is tracking on par or above CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE WINTER SOLDIER ($95M opening).
I'm leaving you with some images of 3ality Technica's native 3D camera rigs in action on the production - it doesn't get any better than this! Get ready for some Michael Bay explosions and Mark Walhberg expletives! :-)
Here's a new trailer for Michael Bay's TRANSFORMERS: AGE OF EXTINCTION. The effects look jaw dropping good as usual for these films and with the addition of Mark Wahlberg and a "soft reboot" of the story, I'm hoping for a revitalized franchise that focuses more on human characters and their journey.
The movie stars Wahlberg, Nicola Peltz, Jack Reynor, Stanley Tucci, Kelsey Grammar and Li Bingbing.
Here's the storyline for the movie: TRANSFORMERS: AGE OF EXTINCTION is the fourth film in director Michael Bay’s global blockbuster franchise. The film begins after an epic battle that left a great city torn, but with the world saved. As humanity picks up the pieces, a shadowy group reveals itself in an attempt to control the direction of history… while an ancient, powerful new menace sets Earth in its crosshairs. With help from a new cast of humans, Optimus Prime (voiced by Peter Cullen) and the Autobots rise to meet their most fearsome challenge yet. In an incredible adventure, they are swept up in a war of good and evil, ultimately leading to a climactic battle across the world.
Tim here, and I just finished the first day of CinemaCon. There's more that will happen through the rest of the week than today because today was a start day. Mainly registration, plus a opening dinner, but most importantly a presentation from Paramount Studios. Paramount showed exclusive footage from their upcoming line up of films. Stars were on hand for the presentations such as Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson (Hercules), Will Arnett and guest David Cross (Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles) entered in on segways, and finally Mark Wahlberg, his daughter, and upcoming stars Nicola Peltz and Jack Reynor (Transformers: Age of Extinction).
I can't go into too much detail about the footage seen, but all these films are being released in Stereoscopic 3D. This means that all these movies will be pretty big at the box office. Hercules was more or less a new trailer, and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles was the teaser trailer that's coming out this Thursday morning. The most amount of footage shown was for Transformers: Age of Extinction, which looks like it's bigger than any of the previous Transformers movies.
The footage we saw showcased a good deal of the beginning of the film that sets up the story. We see the relationship between Wahlberg's character and his daugher played by Nicola Peltz. He's a character the audience is instantly going to connect with and Wahlberg looks like he has fun with the role. We got to see plenty of explosions and destruction caused by the Transformers and the humans fighting them.The VFX for the film already look spectacular as we likely were seeing rough drafts or uncompleted shots (some shots still had green screen), and the movie could be the biggest in the franchise. It helps having a star like Wahlberg. Michael Bay wasn't in attendence because he was busy working on the the film.
In regards to the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles teaser trailer it was pretty action packed. You'll be able to check it out later this week, but the advance preview did assure that I can tell you that it will feature the CGI turtles front and center. They look pretty massive standing in front of Megan Fox, who plays April O'Neil. Hercules will also be an action packed film, and with Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson at the film's center it should be a fun thrill ride.
Overall it was a great opening day. Sadly none of those presentations were in 3D, but I did check out a demonstration from Real D about their TrueImage technology that I'll write about later in the week. Also, MasterImage has their new MI-Horizon3D system which I got to check out so I'll write about that later as well. Keep an eye out for the 3D news here on MarketSaw reporting from Caesars Palace in Las Vegas!
About CinemaCon
CinemaCon will attract upwards of 5,000 motion picture professionals from all facets of the industry –from exhibition and distribution, to the equipment and concession areas – all on hand to celebrate the movie-going experience and the cinema industry. From exclusive Hollywood product presentations highlighting a slate of upcoming films, to must-see premiere feature screenings, to the biggest stars, producers and directors, CinemaCon will help jumpstart the excitement and buzz that surrounds the summer season at the box office.
CinemaCon is delighted to have both the International Cinema Technology Association (ICTA) and National Association of Concessionaires (NAC) as its tradeshow partners. CinemaCon is also delighted to have as its official presenting sponsor, The Coca-Cola Company, one of the industry's greatest and highly regarded and respected partners in the world of the movies.
I just experienced the TRANSFORMERS 3D Ride at Universal and WOW - thrilling! I had a Front Of The Line pass so I was able to see it multiple times and it never got old. One scene in particular involving a floor of a building (if you've seen it you know what I mean) is just jaw dropping. I won't say more! See it for yourself!!
And a great way to break into a post about the movie franchise too! With Michael Bay's recent muse Mark Wahlberg (PAIN AND GAIN) joining him, Michael Bay is coming back to his Transformers franchise in a different way with TRANSFORMERS 4 kicking off a new trilogy of movies.
So where do you suppose he's going with this movie?
Here's what Bay had to say about TRANSFORMERS 4 recently: “We’re going to start off smaller. There’s a brand new cast. To freshen the franchise we’ve redesigned everything from top to bottom. The history of the first three movies is still there, we start four years later and there’s a reason why we’re meeting a new cast. Mark is really excited about it and it’s a great redesign. I said that 3 was going to be my last one. Paramount was letting me do PAIN AND GAIN and the Transformers ride was opening at Universal and it was bittersweet to think of passing it off. I wanted to set it up on a really sure footing and to bring someone else in on that, it would have been overwhelming. We keep the Transformers the way they were, it’s just four years later. There’s a reason the Transformers are redesigned. We’re trying to broaden the franchise and give it more places to go.”
Sounds great to me. I'm all for the continuation of such a visually rich franchise with some fresh content brought in. I'd like to see some solid storytelling in there too of course.
A while ago, Michael Bay quickly dismissed rumors about Mark Wahlberg being considered for TRANSFORMERS 4 but apparently those very same rumors got Michael Bay thinking about actually using Wahlberg for the the movie. That, or the original rumors were true. Doesn't really matter though - the end result is that Bay is indeed thinking very seriously about Wahlberg and it looks like it will happen.
Hit the jump to read what Bay had to say on the matter:
