Talladega Nights races to victory
It was a pretty good week for your stocks and for your entertainment. Welcome back, ladies and gentlemen. I'm Charles Jurries, your host for The Weekend Recap. For those of you who are new to this site, I'll explain the format. First, we give you a very brief recap of the stock market. Honestly, if you blink, you'll miss it. Secondly, we give you a look at the box office receipts for the weekend. Finally, we match those box office receipts with predictions that we made earlier on in the week to see if I'm a psychic - or a poser.
The stock market closed mostly flat for the week. One impressive note is that Q2 results from companies were pretty good, despite the fact that economic growth is clearly slowing down. On Friday, the July employment data was released. In it, there were a reported 113,000 addition nonfarm payroll jobs added. While those numbers are good, the numbers were below the 125,000 to 150,000 jobs expected. All eyes are now on the Fed, which meets Tuesday, August 8th, to determine whether or not to raise interest rates again. Right now, the consensus is that the Fed will keep the rate at the current levels, as the economy seems to be halting. Here now is your weekly stock scoreboard for the week.
And now we enter the movies phase of the Recap. Look carefully... Hidden inside this recap is the 29th glyph! (We jest, we jest. Rachel Blake would never stoop that low as to hide something on this site.) This weekend at the box office, the NASCAR-themed Will Ferrell comedy vehicle Talladega Nights: The Legend of Ricky Bobby raced into first place, winning an estimated $47 million over three days. (I'm such an Alias geek. I laugh whenever I see the number 47 anywhere!) The film also has a much too-long title. Honestly, look at how cramped it is in the scoreboard below! It's terrible! It's even worse than The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift, or even The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe! We'll shut up for a second so you too can lament the squished letters on the box office scoreboard.
It's time for Reality vs. Predictions! As we know, anybody can make predictions. But can anybody face the music when reality comes to play? We do. Of course, it's slightly unfair, because we made the predictions, we're judging ourselves and we're defending ourselves too... It's a court of one! (Click here to read the predictions)
We said: 1. Tallageda Nights: T.B.O.R.B., $30-$35 million
The truth: 1. Tallageda Nights: T.B.O.R.B., $47 million.
We said: 2. The Descent, $20-$25 million
The truth: 2. The Barnyard, $16 million.
We said: 3. Pirates 2, $20-$25 million
The truth: 3. Pirates 2, $11 million.
We said: 4. Miami Vice, $15-$20 million
The truth: 4. Miami Vice, $9.7 million
We said: 5. John Tucker Must Die, $15-$20 million
The truth: 5. The Descent, $8.8
The Verdict: I need to get a clue as to what on earth I'm talking about. I got 3/5's of the movie titles in the right spot, I didn't come to accurately guessing the box office intake. As most people say when they're having a bad week as well, live and learn, and hopefully next week's predictions will be truer to life than to fiction.
And that's it! Yup, it's that painless. Well, maybe not completely pain-less... The Reality vs. Predictions section was pretty brutal to read. Oh well. For a fresh batch of predictions, a snarky look at the new releases at the box office, plus a quick update on the stock market, come back next week Wednesday when The Weekend Preview goes live! Until then, stay safe and remember: friends don't let friends get outer-ear infections!
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