DreamWorks Animation has gotten some badly needed good news this week. Its stock rose after the unexpected strong showing at the box office of its latest release “Home.”
On Monday DreamWorks Animation’s shares rose $1.68, or about 7%, to $24.36.
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Last year the company’s stock fell 40% due to losses from flops like Penguins Of Madagascar, Mr. Peabody & Sherman, Turbo, and Rise Of The Guardians.
Tony Wible, an analyst with Janney Capital Markets, said of the news that, “It’s a huge morale boost both for investors and employees at the company. The film business is what’s been languishing there, and these results mean they avoid another impairment and have found a possible other franchise.”
The film, which stars Rihanna and Steve Martin, grossed $54 million in the US over the weekend and another $47.5 million internationally according to Boxofficemojo.com. This in spite of getting terrible reviews and only a 43% rating from the movie review website Rotten Tomatoes.
But it remains to be seen if the film will earn back its reported $130 million budget. It will not if its ticket sales plummet next weekend. The movie’s success last weekend may only have resulted from the slow movie season and little competition in the category of family films right now.
Fortunately for it, there are no other family films being released before this coming Easter wakened.
“Home, ” however, is now the third largest non-sequel opening in DreamWorks Animation history after “Kung Fu Panda” ($60.2 million) and “Monsters vs. Aliens” ($59.3 million).
“Home” will be the studio’s only release for the year 2015. Its next film is not due out until mid-2016.
