The distributors’ of BAFTA’s favourite film, The King’s Speech, have more confidence than the King that their film portrays.Weekend one on 398 screens: £3.5m and the number one spot.
Weekend two on 428 screens: £4.4m and the number one spot again, for a £10.8m running total.
According to my records, the last few films to open at number one and then increase the following weekend’s take are: Slumdog Millionaire, The Fellowship of the Rings, er, Antz, Seven and Jumanji.
That’s a ballsy move to open such a high quality, awards-worthy movie, with no box office stars involved in front or behind the camera, on so many screens. It’s simply not been the done thing since Lawrence Of Arabia inadvertently set the release template for awards movies. Even with the outstanding reviews the film had generated at its festival screenings during the autumn and winter of 2010, I would not have had the cojones of the distributors: more power to their elbows, etc.
With a Globe already in the bag for Colin Firth, and surely a BAFTA award and an Oscar still to come for him alone, this very British film (stately paced, gentle humour, elegant wordplay, understated emotions, and a rousing finale) is set to be the breakout hit of 2011.
It should be settling on the £20m mark (ie qualify for the end of year top 10 box office championship) by the end of its fourth weekend, with at least another month still to play. Its clear target is to beat Slumdog Millionaire’s £31.2m haul.
Every now and again a genuinely great film proves popular with the people: and that this film has so chimed with a wide audience restores my faith in the British public.
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