The Weekend Report

Despite new franchise entries, once again Jurassic World and Inside Out led the frame with respective weekend estimates of $30.9 million and $30.2 million. The Independence holiday freshmen followed with Terminator Genisys grossing $28.2 million and Magic Make XXL stripping off $11.8 million.

Exclusive newcomers were dominated by the launch of Amy, the documentary on the late singer Winehouse. It bowed to a potent $241,000 at six sites. There were also OK results for UK import Jimmy’s Hall and nonfiction Cartel Land.

In the niches, the inspirational Faith of Our Fathers failed to rally the troops with a $451,000 tally and Tamil Papanasam had a soft bow of $222,000. Hindi Second Hand Husband was comparably bland.

The holiday session generated close to $140 million and sank 26% from seven days earlier. It was nonetheless 6% improved from 2014 when the second weekend of Transformers: Age of Extinction led with $37.1 million and newcomer Tammy opened to $21.6 million.

With the 4th of July falling on a Saturday, distribution and exhibition collectively girded for a mid-weekend downturn that proved to be even more severe than anticipated. The last time the holiday configured this way was 2009 and box office was 15% better notwithstanding then-lower ticket prices.

The last incarnation of The Terminator was also in 2009 and the franchise has certainly tilted toward “I’ll be back” rather than “Hasta la vista, baby” during its three-decade history. The new creative team brought back Arnold Schwarzenegger and much of the story and characters of the original. Tracking had it competitive and likely dominant in its debut and its Wednesday bow generated a pre-weekend box office of $15.5 million.

Terminator Genisys opened a week earlier in 11 mostly second-tier territories overseas to $7 million. This weekend’s international expansion of 36 territories pumped up box office to $74 million and took the sting out of damp domestic box office. Studio exit polls identified North American viewers as 62% male with 65% aged 25-years and older.

Pre-weekend business for Magic Mike XXL was on par with industry frontrunners with a two-day tally of $15 million. But it was all downward from there as it defied tracking estimates of about $35 million for its opening five days. The rapid decline has resulted in severe studio head-scratching as both key reviews and audience response was positive. A studio spokesman said it was playing best in the heartland and underperforming in urban centers.

The gender split was unquestionably a “girls night out” with an audience described as 96% female. The last film to skew to that extreme was Sex and the City and its sequel. The audience was also 73% aged 25-years and older.

The hefty debut of Amy had one distributor envious of the avalanche of media attention accorded the potent profile. Apart from the film’s artistic qualities and marketing acumen one can well understand scribes’ desire to sink their collective teeth into something substantive in a season of predictable (and worse) onslaught of sequels, remakes amd reboots. One doesn’t have to go that far back to recall last summer’s Boyhood as an example of this phenom.

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