After the premiere, "The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey" was released in nearly sixty countries and regions, including North America, and in the words of many media outlets, Peter Jackson led the army back to his homeland.

This return is destined to be a journey of collecting money.

"The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey" opened in North America with more than 3,100 theaters, earning $13.9 million in advance, setting a record for the best advance performance in film history in December.

By Friday, the film had expanded to 4,050 theaters in North America, topping the North American Friday box office with $37.5 million, breaking the first-day box office record in December film history.

Although the pace of the film is a bit slow, which makes it seem to be lengthy, with the effect of Middle-earth and the Lord of the Rings trilogy, "Unexpected Journey" still performs well in terms of all-important audience reputation, with a CinemaScore of "A" for live audiences, and even an increase to "A+" among audiences under the age of 18, proving that the film also has a pretty good family affinity.

CinemaScore released a forecast that the future box office development of this film should be healthy and orderly, and it is expected to achieve long-term box office revenue.

With the blessing of IMAX, 3D and the high expectations brought by the previous work, it is logical that the re-attack of another trilogy has made a good start at the box office, although it is lacking in the number of moviegoers, but under the high ticket office of IMAX and 3D, the box office revenue still maintains a considerable number.

On Saturday, the film took another $27.73 million from North America, a slight increase from Friday, when the early box office was removed, and the trend was healthy and stable.

All of this indicates that the release of "Unexpected Journey", a prequel to the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy, has brought fans' minds back to the magnificent and haunting world of Middle-earth.

And the film uses the latest 3D and 48 frames high frame photography technology to present a more lifelike fantasy world on the screen, and director Peter Jackson has once again become a cutting-edge leader in fantasy films.

The release of "The Hobbit" once again set off a fantasy storm.

Since the new millennium, Hollywood's fantasy movies have become more and more prosperous, although there are many works that hit the streets, there are always box office hits, and the representative of this is undoubtedly the "Lord of the Rings" series and the "Harry Potter" series.

Even works such as "The Chronicles of Narnia", "Alice in Wonderland" and "Pirates of the Caribbean" have been classified as fantasy series by Hollywood.

Fantasy cinema has never been as brilliant as it has been since the new millennium.

Matthew combined the current situation in Hollywood, as well as his own experience in the "Pirates of the Caribbean" series and investing in "The Hobbit", and analyzed the reasons from his own perspective.

One of the most important is that fantasy movies need more technical support.

Fantasy movies rely more on pure visual effects and more on computer special effects than science fiction movies.

In the past decade or so, CG technology has advanced by leaps and bounds to create a lifelike fantasy world for the audience, no longer a fantasy.

As a result, in fantasy blockbusters such as "The Lord of the Rings", "Harry Potter", "The Chronicles of Narnia", "Pirates of the Caribbean", and "The Golden Compass", the audience saw countless magical illusions and creatures.

Fantasy movies at this stage are spectacular visual effects blockbusters in the first sense. With the help of digital special effects, the fantasy world built on the screen is also more and more colorful, magnificent and eye-catching, which will naturally be favored by a large number of audiences, after all, most audiences walk into the theater for sensory entertainment.

Maybe it's too much of a philistine to say this, and it doesn't seem to be forced.

Therefore, Matthew summed up a set of high-forcing statements that can be used.

The more developed modern civilization is, the more depressed human nature feels, the more they want to get rid of the cold world of steel and concrete, and yearn for the embrace of nature.

"Avatar" is a science fiction blockbuster, but the most intoxicating and acclaimed Pandora beauty belongs to the fantasy category, which is the reason.

It's a pity that due to time and personal development, Matthew missed the investment in the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy, and the "Hobbit" series he is investing in now is good, but it is still worse than the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy in all aspects.

Especially from the media to the audience's word-of-mouth, it is not as good as the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy.

In Matthew's eyes, these are also reasonable.

After all, "The Hobbit" is not on the same level as "The Lord of the Rings" alone, and the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy is three spectacular masterpieces that occupy a pivotal position in the history of Western fantasy literature, while "The Hobbit" is only a thin volume.

Compared with the epic spirit of "The Lord of the Rings", "The Hobbit" is more like a fairytale adventure saga.

Besides, Matthew's most important thing is the box office.

Although the box office is not everything about a movie, the box office directly affects the income of the whole industry chain of a movie.

This situation has long been clear, investors do not pay attention to the box office, is that possible?

In terms of the most critical box office revenue, "The Hobbit" did not disappoint Matthew, one of the investors, in the three days of the North American opening weekend, the film made a large-scale attack in 4,045 theaters, and won the premiere box office of 84.77 million with an average performance of $20,958 per theater.

This achievement not only far surpassed the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy series a few years ago (the highest was 72.62 million in the third part in 2004), but also set a new record for the highest December opening weekend in film history.

Without any suspense, the first part of "The Hobbit" easily won the top spot at the North American box office charts, beating Spielberg's "Lincoln" and "Life of Pi" and many other competitors.

Although "Lincoln" and "Life of Pi" expanded their releases in early December, the audience for the films was limited after all, and the box office trend has been steady and unpopular, ranking third and fourth at the box office with $7.24 million and $5.4 million, respectively.

In second place was "Twilight: Breaking Dawn (Part II)," which took in another $7.68 million from North America that weekend.

So far, the North American box office of "Breaking Dawn (Part II)" has exceeded the $300 million mark, accumulating $302.56 million.

There is also a peculiar phenomenon in the North American box office charts, with four Matthew-funded films squeezing into the top 10 of the list!

Excluding "The Hobbit" and "Twilight," "American Sniper" took $2.39 million this weekend, ranking ninth, and "The Conjuring" took eighth place with $2.71 million!

The box office of the two films is equally impressive, with "American Sniper" already crossing the $400 million mark at the North American box office, and "The Conjuring" heading straight to $150 million at the North American box office.

In the words of the Los Angeles Times: This week's North American box office charts are ironclad facts to prove why Matthew Horner is known as a gold investor and producer in addition to superstars!

There is also a lot of talk on the Internet.

"Matthew Horner is definitely a super winner in the film industry!"

"I don't think Jerry Bruckheimer could have done that with Matthew in his best days. ”

"Individually, Matthew Horner is the first person in Hollywood. ”

"Let me worship the winners in life, as if Matthew Horner's starting point is much lower than mine......"

There are many similar comments, and the Internet presents a variety of life situations, and there are all kinds of envy, jealousy and hatred for Matthew.

Fortunately, Matthew has never gone through the character of a winner in life, otherwise it will be very troublesome in the future.

"The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey" is not only a big hit in North America, but also a box office hit around the world.

The film, which was released simultaneously in 56 locations outside of North America, earned $138.2 million at the overseas box office that weekend and grossed more than $223 million worldwide, surpassing the large-scale overseas release of Life of Pi and topping the global box office charts of the week.

Life of Pi has also grossed well, with a total of nearly $120 million outside of North America, but the film tends to be too market-oriented.

Ang Lee's identity and the influence of the two films "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" and "Lust and Caution", as well as the status of the Chinese Oscar for Best Director, made him very popular on the other side of the Pacific, and the box office generated on the other side of the Pacific alone accounted for more than 65% of the overseas box office of "Life of Pi".

The film market on the other side of the Pacific Ocean is obviously getting bigger and bigger, and there is gradually a trend that a single market can support a first-line production with a small investment.

In addition, "American Sniper" and "Twilight: Breaking Dawn (Part II)" also continue to be screened overseas.

The former has grossed nearly $700 million worldwide, while the latter has easily crossed $600 million.

Judging from the current screening situation, these two films still have a certain market potential to be tapped.

In contrast, because of the relationship between horror films, the market volume of "The Conjuring" is limited, and the potential is consumed faster, and it is gradually declining.

However, the film's global box office total also reached a whopping $368.71 million.

There is no doubt that it has been an extremely fruitful year for Matthew.

After returning to Los Angeles, Matthew has not planned to go out again in recent months, and in addition to exchanging roles with Christopher Nolan about "Interstellar", on the one hand, he is preparing to participate in several events organized by the academy to help his friend Michael Fassbender promote "The Biography of Jobs", and on the other hand, he is always keeping an eye on Harvey Weinstein and Weinstein Pictures, waiting for the best opportunity.

What Matthew didn't expect was that before he made a move, Harvey Weinstein took the initiative to jump out because of the failure to compete for the investment in "The Hobbit" that year.