Weekend 3-Day Estimates by Baby New Year Klady
The holidays did the job they were meant to do, though there were no truly positive surprises. Strong numbers for Rogue One lead the way. Sing delivers strong numbers, but not up to Illumination’s recent history, although it is already past Trolls. (Moana is ahead of both.) Passengers‘ $61 million seems okay… until you look at the movie’s cost. La La Land has the best per-screen of any film in more than 25 venues, with 750 runs. Hidden Figures and Patriots Day seem primed for strong January expansion.
My favorite international phenomenon lately is the inexplicable popularity of Damien Chazelle in South Korea. WHIPLASH nearly matched its domestic gross there, and LA LA will exceed tentpoles like SUICIDE SQUAD and BvS.
For what it’s worth, SING is on pace to out-gain DESPICABLE ME domestically. Not sure if that’s surprising, but it certainly is nice. The intl numbers are a bit weaker than expected it appears, but China, France, Italy, Russia, the UK and Japan are still on deck.
I finally got around to Rogue One. It’s been batted around here enough so I won’t waste too much time on it but I did like it a lot. Maybe more than TFA. Took some time because it felt like (and essentially is) fan fiction at first, but when it got going it was a lot of fun. Thought it played fair with the franchise, the mythos, the characters, whatever. I know some around here thought the choice to go a bit dark was wrong, and I respect their opinion, but I liked it and appreciated it had the guts to end as it did. It seemed appropriate as the following chapter is called A New Hope, implying that previously there was no or little hope. Whatever. I’m over-analyzing. It didn’t knock anything off my top 10 list but I’m happy that Star Wars is back.
Edwards does great with scale and action. I loved Monsters, and I also loved his Godzilla (one of the few).
My daughters are SO excited to see Hidden Figures. Looking forward to that expansion and a great time with my kids.
Anyone seen JULIETA? Stunning that it’s outperformed LIVE BY NIGHT, TONI ERDMANN, and A MONSTER CALLS in back-to-back limited weekends.
Sometimes, at some levels, Quality is a Thing.
Sideshow, I think I’m in the camp that also liked it better than The Force Awakens – structurally, it’s much messier but Edwards seems to be a much more distinctive director of action and spectacle than Abrams.
And MAN, Edwards knows how to film his monsters doing what they do best! I’m very torn as to which setpiece was more impressive: Godzilla finally taking down those two MUTO’s with his atomic breath or ‘Vader tearing up that hallway of Rebel soldiers….in both cases, I was left wanting more which always bodes well. Jeez here’s an idea: let HIM have at it with a R-rated, balls-out Predator and/or Terminator epic – both of those properties need some one like him to reinvigorate them.
Oh god…no more Terminators. Please. Series ended on T2. They should have left it there. Without Cameron and Schwarzenegger it’s just not a thing.
Fine let him take on a new Predator film.
The 4 way race between Dr Strange, Beasts, Moana and Sing is kind of interesting to avid box office watchers like myself.
The only actor that could possibly replace Arnold is franchise joiner Dwayne The Rock Johnson in a new Terminator movie. Go brave, have Arnold truly be decommissioned but not before passing the reins to The Rock. And I say give it to George Miller to direct.
@Bulldog, the BEASTS vs STRANGE battle has gotten interesting again, after I thought STRANGE had locked it up. But I don’t think there’s any question SING and MOANA will pass both, and SING will be #1.
MOANA is now $46 million ahead of TANGLED, and continues to extend its lead, which means it will finish at more than $10 million ahead of the live action contenders.
SING is already where MOANA was the day after Christmas, and will be within striking distance by the end of this weekend. I have a hard time grasping DP’s commentary that Illumination will never again release a December movie because of SING’s performance. It’s going to blow the roof off ALVIN, which spawned 3 sequels and cost only a little less. The thing could top every non-sequel Dreamworks release in history, adjusted for inflation (inlcluding PANDA, DRAGON and MADAGASCAR), aside from SHREK at a fraction of the cost in some cases. Maybe it’ll crater post-holidays, but right now $275 million domestic and $525 million worldwide are in range, and given these things are so cheap…
“The only actor that could possibly replace Arnold is franchise joiner Dwayne The Rock Johnson in a new Terminator movie. Go brave, have Arnold truly be decommissioned but not before passing the reins to The Rock. And I say give it to George Miller to direct.”
You know it has just become so commonplace to cite Duane Johnson as the “next Arnold Schwarzenegger” over the past 15 years but I’m starting to see Johnson occupying a different sort of space – he seems to have more range and is not inhibited by a distinct accent at all. His sheer absurd SIZE seems to limit things a bit and from what I have read, the guy is such a hardcore fitness freak that he’s not likely to dramatically change his body type anytime soon for the right type of role. But I could see him taking on some real character roles or at least scene-stealing villains – he could probably take on some of the same type of roles that Alec Baldwin was about 15 years ago.
As for the “next Schwarzenegger” I think there might be some more promising candidates: Jason Mamoa seems that he could occupy that same space very well and I wouldn’t mind seeing him take on a Terminator. I am VERY jazzed to see him play a bad-ass Aquaman as silly as it sounds.
December was a less proven time for a major animated movie. Frozen, Moana, Toy Story 2, and Tangled were all Thanksgiving releases for example. But Sing turned that into an opportunity with a big animated movie that had little direct competition. I think it’s similar to how Uni also took the last weekend of April and turned it into a huge weekend for Fast and Furious. I don’t see why Illumination would give that up if they’ve developed that slot for themselves.
The Rock has changed his body a lot in the last few years. Sure. He’s big, but he’s a lot smaller than he used to be. Seriously, look at him in his first FF movie, and him in Fate trailer. He’s so much notably smaller, and this has been your Dwayne Johnson body discussion.
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How can that be the whole discussion when we haven’t brought up gynecomastia surgery?
ERDMANN is gonna be a tough sell. A three-hour German comedy? And one that’s far more outrageous than any American film would dare be? I hope it catches on, but I suspect it will find its cult way down the road.