Weekend Estimates by Disney Hold Klady
What is remarkable about this weekend isn’t the grosses, but the Disney holds. 59% for Captain America: Civil War is exceptional. The Jungle Book dropping just 28% screams repeat viewing. And even Zootopia was off only 15%. On the arthouse side, The Lobster (from the hipsters at A24) and Love & Friendship (from that veteran distributor, Amazon Studios) were on four screens each and both managed over $30k per screen… not earth-shattering, but a solid sample for indie… now word of mouth…
CA:CW held, according to estimate, just 2% less than Deadpool, which was by all accounts loved by its audiences. The Jungle Book isn’t holding quite as well as Zootopia in Weekend 6, but still, that’s a comparison to one of the strongest surprise holders of recent years. By the way, Zootopia is now at $970 million worldwide. The downside, as though there is one for this kind of success, is that about a quarter of that gross is from China, cutting the rental dollars returned to Disney on that money at about 40% of what it gets from the rest of the world, making a $120 million return into just under $50 million. Maybe MPAA should hire Donald Trump to negotiate the exhibition agreement with China after he loses the run for the presidency.
In other news… Money Monster was a meh opener, but not a disaster in context. It is Jodie Foster’s first wide release movie as a director and did better per-screen than any of the other three films. It opened better than Clooney’s The American, which was considered a success (in part, because it was so unexpected). Another Clooney hit, Monuments Men, opened a bit better, but was an all-star romp. In other words, if this holds fairly well and does $50 million domestic… it will be fine. And it will be fascinating to see if it plays at all overseas.
For inexplicable reasons (taxes/avoiding obligations of the parent company?), small distributor, FilmDistrict, launched an arm called High-Top, which this weekend released its second horror film in two years (The Darkness) and… didn’t work out. The first film, The Green Inferno, had a lot of publicity from the media. Still only did only $7.2 million… so this is an improvement. Doesn’t feel like much of one.
On the indie side, it was all The Lobster and Love & Friendship. Big per-screen openings. And whatever these films do, it will be almost completely on marketing and word-of-mouth, as the talent hasn’t done a lot of promotion for either.
Looks like EtGuild2 was pretty accurate in terms of how the weekend would play out.
“High-Rise” was obviously hurt by its VOD availability (that’s how I saw it), but there’s no excuse for “Sunset Song” not opening a lot better.
JFC, people!
Terrence Davies is one of the greatest filmmakers alive, and every new Davies movie is an event. Or should be.
Attention must be paid.
(Cue crickets sound.)
Very promising bows for “The Lobster” and Whit Stillman, though, so all is not lost.
On a more alarming note, we are 20 weekends into the year with only 4 distributors having had a #1 weekend. That hasn’t happened since 1985.
Gotta see “Sunset Song!”
For A24 comps, LOBSTER has a slightly better bow than BLING RING and MOST VIOLENT year, and a slightly worse one than SPECTACULAR NOW, SPRING BREAKERS and WHILE WE’RE YOUNG. That would normally indicate $5 million is very very likely, but LOBSTER is so weird who knows how it’ll play out.
ZOOTOPIA had one of those rare, bizarre weekends where its second-run release ran into its first-run release. Both ZOOTOPIA and JUNGLE BOOK overtook ALICE IN WONDERLAND in the daily race this weekend. JUNGLE BOOK is still running slightly ahead of INSIDE OUT.
ETGuild, on yesterday’s box office you asked about Money Monster. I loved it. Highly entertaining, sardonic, and bitterly funny. I think based on the marketing materials, people expected some message movie about Wall Street, and because it’s Foster/Clooney, the expectation was that an indictment of Wall Street should’ve been more substantial. However, I think you could make the argument that the movie doesn’t even care one bit about fraud or regulating Wall Street, or crooked CEOs. All of that comes from the Jack O’Connell character and in my view, people were just humoring him in order to save their own asses.
Yeah because when Marvel/Disney spent a month and serious bank launching multiple advance screenings and premieres, sending out the Russo Brothers to schmooze every online critic, and they were able to nab a Rotten Tomatoes score above 90%, I’m SURE they were shooting for a 60% drop on the second weekend against minimal competition. 😉
Keep moving those goalposts, Geoff.
Jodie Foster also had HOME FOR THE HOLIDAYS open in wide release. (1,000 theaters counted as a wide release in 1995, and I think it still counts as one today.)
@alex: Based solely on the marketing, yes, I think people would be expecting a message movie about Wall Street. From the very first commercial for MONEY MONSTER, I would have expected the film’s theme to be “The real villains are the crooks on Wall Street, while the kidnapper with the gun and the bomb is really a good guy.” I haven’t seen the film, so I don’t know if that is an accurate description of the film, but that is what the trailers and commercials make it look like.
CIVIL WAR is going to make 300-400 million more than WINTER SOLDIER. You can minimize the success all you want, but why would you?
@alex, well put. Poor Jodie Foster just wants to have fun when she’s behind the camera (One of her OITNB episodes is called “Lesbian Request Denied”), but the media treats her work like she’s Sean Penn because of her public persona and I guess that’s why it was sold as such. And yeah, the cast here added to it..Clooney and Roberts can’t catch a break when they’re in thriller mode, because everyone expects an “important” hybrid like “Erin Brokovich” or “Michael Clayton,” while the presence of O’Connell, perhaps the most “serious” working actor under 30 (Starred Up, ’71, Unbroken) exacerbates it even more.
With TULIP FEVER and HHhH up next, I suggest that O’Connell nabs the role of Nick Furry, chief veterinarian in Leah’s Cat-tastic Avengers reboot before he’s pigeon-holed into Ben Foster territory.
Geoff, both Iron Man 3 and Avengers 2 opened to 150 million+ and dropped about 58% and 59% in their second weekends, respectively. The only Marvel-produced film that opened bigger than 150 million and dropped less than 58% in its sophomore weekend is the first Avengers.
Assuming the actuals from Civil War (to be reported tomorrow) hold, a 59% drop is hardly an unexpected blow, no matter how hard you try to diminish its success.
Yeah I’ll admit I was being snarky with that earlier post, my apologies. It’s becoming increasingly obvious that these larger comic book tentpoles are getting pretty front-loaded – I’m still pretty surprised that Civil War had that big of a drop considering how much praise it has received, but it’s pretty much performing like the last two Marvel Studios may tentpoles.
I’m happy for all the good fortune Cleveland natives Joe and Anthony Russo are having at Marvel Corp.
I still remember their kids-in-a-candyshop glee while co-directing their first film (the Clooney/Soderbergh-produced “Welcome to Collinwood”) on location here in 2001.
They’re genuinely good guys, and deserve all their success.
Wait…the guys who are going to direct the most-expensive movie of all time are from the Mistake By the Lake? Oy…Marvel is doomed :p.
I don’t care how universally loved a movie is; unless you’re The Force Awakens, which probably had the most perfect release date of all time, you’re not going to see a mega-opener drop less than 50% in its second weekend (give or take a couple of percentage points; I think Jurassic World managed 49%). Also, CW had the 8th highest 2nd weekend of all time, and at its current rate, will end its domestic run at around $430.
I cant find any word on AmeriGGedon!!
Has anyone seen it or are the only reviews available being broadcast over HAM radio?
How DARE you speak it’s name on a site devoted to the spread of transgender bathrooms and Islamo-nazi godlessness!
HAM radio got a chuckle over here.
I really don’t get all the critical LOVE for Civil War. My family and I sat through one showing and while we enjoyed the Spider and Ant Man bits (although Legends of Tomorrow had kinda done the Giant in a suit on TV the week before) , my daughter and I enjoyed Batman v Superman more, especially the Batman parts.
And there you have gone and spoiled the ant man part to those of us who live in the ancillary world. Everyone has been so careful up Itill now and you had to spill the beans on a little moment of wow I was going to have on my netflix feed next January (for all the years for a licensing agreement to come through …hey).
Yes it has been out for two weeks and a third of North America has seen it. But between Star Wars and Zootopia and the spring break vacation I cannot possibly funnel any more money into the Disney machine this year so keep the revelations to a minimum 🙂
Kylo Ren kills his dad, who is Han Solo. Whatever. Grow up. These are fucking cartoons.
“Unless you’re watching Jacques Audiard or Claire Denis, I’m going to ruin your movie-watching experience because the idea of enjoying yourself makes me angry and you deserve to be punished.”-spassky
Ant man was in at least one trailer. You know Black Panther’s in it too?
Apparently I wasn’t snarky enough, iwas kidding and not actually expecting people to hold their tongues until I got around to viewing this in the pay cable window.
Doug R – The spoiler Hcat was joking about was Ant Man related, but not Ant Man per se, if you know what I mean.
Very late to the party. Please excuse my tardiness, but I feel like chiming in all the same. Finally saw Civil War this morning. I’m not a big fan of Marvel movies but the trailer is great and made me want to see it. $5 matinee on an ultra screen so figured why not. Having seen it I’m reminded why these movies just aren’t for me. Didn’t like it at all. Overstuffed is a vast understatement. I felt like I was watching 7 different movies crammed into 150 minutes. Oh look Black Panther. Hey wait there’s Spiderman. And a ton of other characters I don’t really know much or care about. There’s abrupt and awkward tonal shifts. The insanely tedious and dull big airport battle isn’t one seamless scene but a series of stops and starts designed to give each character their moment in the sun. Plus the stakes are nonexistent. I never felt like anyone was in real danger. It never feels like they won’t bro hug at the end of the day. I also didn’t care about Bucky or his fate, so it’s hard to care much about why they are fighting. If forced to pick a side, I’m with Iron Man. Cap seems a little too right-wing here. By the end of the airport battle I was spent and ready for the movie to be over. It feels much longer than 150 minutes. I like that it’s not destruction porn, but I was still bored nearly the entire time. Overstuffed, overlong, and tedious.
^ “Cap seems a little too right-wing here.”
Well, he does dress all in red, white & blue.
Ha yes that is true Pete.
So having no intention of seeing it, but curious to how if it continues the junior high asexual vibe of the previous entries, does anyone even kiss in Civil War? Can there be a great movie without kissing? (Ok Lawrence of Arabia but it was hinted there was plenty of stuff happening out of the cameras eye so as not to shock fine upstanding Methidosts)
Speaking of the spoiler above, if ants mans power is that he shrinks to ant size and retains his human strength, why does that not stay true in his later identitys? And why for a film that wants to halt global destruction do they go after the guy with the shield, the arrows, the wings, and the busty gymnast, subtract the off world god whose brother caused the first apocoplyse, and the gamma monster, and choose as its hero the guy who created the second apocalypse who after being warned against it started to meld alien technology with his home based AI, and then went to get a sandwich thinking everything would be alright. If there was any fallout from the events of Ultron, would t it be Starks liability as opposd to registering Hawkeye?
Hcat: There’s a smooch in Civil War between Cap and Agent Sharon Carter (Emily Van Camp).
Hmmm. Isn’t he a little old for her?
Yeah, if they ever get married, I’d love to see the court clerk’s face when he sees their birth certificates.
Cap’s a little sensitive about registering seeing as he spent one movie fighting a government that forced people to register and another movie where the organization he worked for was going to track and destroy anyone special at all.
The Russos are obviously great in the room… really mediocre filmmakers though. TV, 100%.