Jun 18 2009 08:54 PM ET

Box Office Preview: 'The Proposal' and 'Year One' aim to take down 'The Hangover'

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The-proposal_l The R-rated comedy The Hangover has been the surprise No. 1 movie for the past two weekends — but will its reign come to an end this time around? Maybe. Two more comedies (The Proposal and Year One) enter the multiplex, but neither seems like a sure winner. In other words, it’ll be yet another closely fought box office battle.

1. The Proposal — $24 million
In this rom-com, Sandra Bullock and EW cover hunk Ryan Reynolds play coworkers who decide to marry to avoid her deportation to Canada. Despite multiple attempts, Reynolds has yet to break out as a box office force, and Bullock, though still an undeniably big star, has never had a movie open north of Premonition‘s $17.6 mil two years ago. In fact, she hasn’t made a movie since then. So while this seems to be the biggest film of the weekend and the buzz is good, a $24 mil gross would have to be considered a sizable success.

2. The Hangover — $23 million
A threepeat is very, very possible.

3. Up — $22 million
With $195 mil in the bank already, the animated film will surely break the $200 mil mark, like, today, and it’s well on pace to be one of Pixar’s biggest earners ever. Oh, and it, too, could wind up winning the weekend.

4. Year One — $16 million
How can you go wrong with stars Jack Black and Michael Cera (who play two prehistoric dudes), director Harold Ramis, and producer Judd Apatow? Then again, Year One appears to be the exact kind of young-skewing, middle-playing funny flick that big hit The Hangover really isn’t (and flop Land of the Lost kinda was). Which has me nervous about its prospects.

5. The Taking of Pelham 123 — $14 million
That $23.4 mil debut was nice enough (if perhaps a tad disappointing), and the John Travolta-Denzel Washington thriller stands to benefit from being the only major non-comedy in the marketplace this weekend.

More Box Office news:
‘Hangover’ hangs on to the box office lead with $33.4 million
‘Hangover’ tops Friday box office with $10.4 million
‘The Hangover’ is a hit: What’s it mean?
Box Office Preview: Will ‘The Hangover’ hold off ‘Pelham 1 2 3′?
Box Office Report UPDATE: Final numbers give ‘The Hangover’ No. 1 spot over ‘Up’

‘The Hangover’ hits a $16.5 mil jackpot on Friday

addCredit(“Kerry Hayes”)

Comments (15 total) Add your comment
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  • pelas

    The Hangover on top again.
    The hottest celeb scenes at http://www.actressscene.com

  • KOZ

    1)The Proposal- $27 Million
    2)Year One- $24 Million
    3)The Hangover- $23 Million
    4)Up- $21 Million
    5)The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3- $15 Million

  • Darrin

    As much as I hate to nitpick, the movie was simply called Premonition, not THE Premonition.

  • bullocked

    I could not believe that about Sandra Bullock so looked it up myself. Even Speed and Miss Congeniality opened lower! I seem to recall a time when she was considered very bankable, but as the main star, she’s only had a single movie barely crack 100 million. I can’t understand where that label came from.

  • ajc

    Her movies tend to have great legs though, at least Miss Congeniality and Two Weeks Notice. The thing is that this movie is the first romantic comedy of the summer with decent buzz. I think it opens around $28M with just under 10,000 per theater. This movie is being billed as a comeback vehicle for her. I think Year One is on pace to be a huge failure like around $17M to open and then a huge drop off. Hangover at $23M and Up at $21M.

  • IMHO

    Have a feeling Hangover will win again. Just saw it yesterday because of word of mouth. Wow! I laughed so hard I cried. In these economic times, nothing beats a GREAT comedy that makes you laugh from beginning to end.

  • graeme

    Yeah, Bullock is a very interesting case. Her movies always have insane legs at the box office, but nothing ever opens big (Speed, While You Were Sleeping, Miss Congeniality, A Time To Kill, Crash, Two Weeks Notice, Divine Secrets Of The Ya-Ya Sisterhood, The Prince Of Egypt, The Net). So yeah, something in the high 20s would be amazing, but either way, I expect the film to have a long life at the box office and come close to breaking $100 million.

  • cfren

    Decent buzz for the Proposal?? Umm…no. 33% fresh on RottenTomatoes is not “decent buzz”. This will bomb; Ryan Reynolds is box office poison.

  • brandon

    proposal-$25m
    hangover-$22m
    up-$21m
    year one-$18
    pelham 123-$12
    the top 4 films could all see #1 this weekend. should be fun!

  • m.

    saw hangover today, not as good as old school (but it’s one of my favorite comedies ever), but still very enjoyable. I like to be treated as adult, not a kid (like most comedies do). Saw trailer of year 1 before Hangover and it looked weak and rip off of several movies (Homo Erectus and some others).

  • Matt2

    Hey Josh!
    I’m thinking also that this weekend is too close to call but I’m going with:
    1) The Hangover- 22 million
    2) The Proposal- 21.5 million
    3) Up- 19 million
    4) Year One- 17 million
    5) Pelham 123- 12.5 million
    I do think that you’ll see a shift on Sunday in which some longer playing films that a Dad might like such as Star Trek, Terminator, etc will see an uptick as children gift their dads with a trip to the movie theater. Overall though, the box office will be weak compared to last summer. The good news for Hollywood is that all changes next week with the opening of the probable box office giant of this summer, Transformers 2.

  • Ashley

    The Proposal was def better than hangover… Dont get me wrong hangover was good… the propsal beat it… I love it!!!

  • Ashley

    oh I am going to go see the proposal again today… I just saw it last night!!! :)

  • The Hangover

    How can you keep calling this the surprise hit of the summer. It has been promoted to death most everyone knew it would be a hit despite not having and stars in it.

  • H-Man

    I hate the fact that Harold Ramis hasn’t really had a hit in a while. I really want to see Year One, but I don’t think it will win the weekend.
    #1 The Proposal: 30 million
    #2 The Hangover: 24 million
    #3 Year One: 17.5 million
    #4 Up: 17.1 million
    #5 The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3: 14 million

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