By Leonard Klady Klady@moviecitynews.com
The Weekend Report
Sayonara Summer
Crazy Rich Asians made it a hat trick atop weekend movie going with an estimated $28.4 million for the four-day Labor holiday.
The closing weekend of summer ended on an upbeat note with a seasonal box office of $4.42 billion that represented a 15% increase from 2017 revenues for the period. Disney was dominant in market share with box office of $1.47 billion that translated into 33.3% of summer revenues.
Universal was the runner up with $727.5 million and almost 16.5% in market share.
The majority of major distributors had a juggernaut title that translated into global box office powerhouses. One could argue that the exception was Warner Bros. that compensated with volume but the end result is filigree.
On the domestic front it was also a good season for alternative films as diverse as Sorry to Bother You, Three Identical Strangers and Eighth Grade. But on a global scale genre fare such as Adrift and Hereditary translated most effectively. The market for non-English language movies continues to erode.
| Weekend (estimates) August 31 – September 3, 2018) | |||||
| Title | Distributor | Gross (average) | % Chng | Thtr | Cume |
| Crazy Rich Asians | WB | 28.4 (7,340) | -11% | 3865 | 117.1 |
| The Meg | WB | 13.5 (3,580) | -18% | 3761 | 123.5 |
| Mission: Impossible – Fallout | Par | 9.1 (3,440) | -13% | 2639 | 206.4 |
| Operation Finale | MGM | 7.8 (4,280) | NEW | 1818 | 9.5 |
| Searching | Sony | 7.5 (6,190) | 1461% | 1207 | 8 |
| Christopher Robin | BV | 6.8 (2,320) | -18% | 2925 | 87.2 |
| Alpha | Sony | 6.0 (2,080) | -25% | 2881 | 28.9 |
| The Happytime Murders | STX/VVS | 5.5 (1,680) | -53% | 3256 | 18.1 |
| BlacKKKlansman | Focus | 5.3 (2,980) | -18% | 1766 | 39.5 |
| Mile 22 | STX/VVS | 4.8 (1,620) | -42% | 2950 | 33 |
| Incredibles 2 | BV | 4.5 (1,570) | 97% | 2890 | 602.4 |
| Kin | Lionsgate | 3.6 (1,690) | NEW | 2141 | 3.6 |
| Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation | Sony | 2.7 (1,910) | -18% | 1421 | 162.6 |
| Ya Veremos | Lionsgate | 2.3 (6,120) | NEW | 369 | 2.3 |
| Slender Man | Sony | 2.2 (1,430) | -35% | 1534 | 28.6 |
| Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom | Uni | 1.9 (1,200) | 104% | 1556 | 415.2 |
| The Equalizer 2 | Sony | 1.8 (1,210) | -32% | 1476 | 100.7 |
| A-X-L | Global Road | 1.8 (1,040) | -51% | 1710 | 5.6 |
| Ant-Man and the Wasp | BV | 1.6 (1,980) | -26% | 830 | 213.8 |
| Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again | Uni | 1.6 (1,550) | -37% | 1010 | 118 |
| Juliet, Naked | Roadside Attractions | 1.0 (3,210) | 239% | 318 | 1.5 |
| The Wife | Sony Classics | .66 (8,470) | 144% | 78 | 1.1 |
| Papillon | Bleecker/Elevation | .49 (900) | -65% | 539 | 2.1 |
| The Little Stranger | Focus | .48 (1,010) | NEW | 474 | 0.48 |
| Mar Gaye Oye Loko | Rising Sun | .46 (7,370) | 62 | 0.46 | |
| Weekend Total ($500,000+ Films) | $120.85 | ||||
| % Change (Last Year) | 27% | ||||
| % Change (Last Week) | -4% | ||||
| Also debuting/expanding | |||||
| The Spy Who Dumped Me | Lionsgate | .44 (960) | -66% | 460 | 33.1 |
| Little Italy | eOne | .44 (3,110) | 22% | 141 | 0.91 |
| Sorry to Bother You | Annapurna/eOne | .34 (670) | 86% | 505 | 17 |
| Eighth Grade | A24 | .33 (1,440) | -37% | 227 | 13 |
| Three Identical Strangers | Neon/Mongrel | .32 (1,870) | -22% | 170 | 11.7 |
| The Bookshop | Greenwich | .31 (4,240) | 219% | 74 | 0.44 |
| Stree | Viva | .28 (4,620) | 60 | 0.28 | |
| Puzzle | Sony Classics | .24 (1,120) | -47% | 213 | 1.6 |
| Imaikkaa Nodigal | Cameo | 86,500 (1,570) | 55 | 0.09 | |
| Yamla Pagla Deewana Phir Se | Zee Studios | 79,700 (1,990) | 40 | 0.08 | |
| The Miseducation of Cameron Post | FilmRise/FWL | 74,300 (1,220) | -50% | 61 | 0.77 |
| Big Brother | Well Go | 52,400 (2,100) | 25 | 0.05 | |
| We the Animals | Orchard | 48,600 (2,700) | -10% | 18 | 0.21 |
| Nartanashala | Nagar | 35,200 (250) | 139 | 0.07 | |
| The Witness | Well Go | 31,900 (2,900) | 11 | 0.03 | |
| Pick of the Litter | IFC | 20,500 (10,250) | 2 | 0.02 | |
| On Your Wedding Day | Opus | 15,200 (5,070) | 3 | 0.02 | |
| Let the Corpses Tan | Kino | 14,600 (4,870) | 3 | 0.01 | |
| Active Measures | Super | 12,700 (4,230) | 3 | 0.01 | |
| Domestic Market Share (January 2 – August 30, 2018) | |||||
| Distributor (releases) | Box Office (millions) | Market Share | |||
| Buena Vista (10) | 2712.9 | 33.10% | |||
| Universal (13) | 1074.4 | 13.10% | |||
| Warner Bros. (22) | 975.8 | 11.90% | |||
| Sony (18) | 771.8 | 9.40% | |||
| 20th Century Fox (11) | 715.6 | 8.70% | |||
| Paramount (8) | 543.6 | 6.60% | |||
| Lionsgate (12) | 237.6 | 2.90% | |||
| STX (8) | 175.6 | 2.10% | |||
| Focus (10) | 151.9 | 1.90% | |||
| Fox Searchlight (4) | 139.8 | 1.70% | |||
| Roadside Attractions (7) | 102.6 | 1.20% | |||
| A24 (8) | 76.8 | 0.90% | |||
| Entertainment (3) | 51.7 | 0.60% | |||
| MGM (3) | 38.8 | 0.50% | |||
| Other * (287) | 439.1 | 5.40% | |||
| 8208 | 100% | ||||
| * none greater than 0.45% | |||||
| Top Limited Releases (January 2 – August 30, 2018) | |||||
| Title | Distributor | Box Office | |||
| Won’t You Be My Neighbor? | Focus | 22,405,337 | |||
| Sorry to Bother You | Annapurna/eOne | 16,690,613 | |||
| RBG | Magnolia/Mongrel | 13,931,018 | |||
| Eighth Grade | A24 | 12,663,293 | |||
| Padmaavat | Viva | 12,159,664 | |||
| Three Identical Strangers | NEON/Mongrel | 11,344,825 | |||
| The Death of Stalin | IFC/Elevation | 8,681,157 | |||
| Sanju | Fox Intl | 7,909,317 | |||
| Leave No Trace | Bleecker/Elevation | 5,783,945 | |||
| Death of a Nation | Quality | 5,662,849 | |||
| Gotti | Vertical | 4,346,788 | |||
| Blindspotting | Lionsgate | 4,177,608 | |||
| Pandas | Imax/WB | 3,957,503 | |||
| Bharat Ane Nenu | Great India | 3,662,967 | |||
| Rangasthalam | Creative | 3,632,267 | |||
| 2018 Oscar Nominated Shorts | Magnolia | 3,508,777 | |||
| Disobedience | Bleecker Street | 3,480,702 | |||
| First Reformed | A24 | 3,448,256 | |||
| The Leisure Seeker | Sony Classics/eOne | 3,226,443 | |||
| Raazi | Zee Studios | 3,027,556 | |||
How the hell did “The Little Stranger” flop so badly?
It has a great cast; (a recently) Oscar-nominated director; an eminently marketable (Gothic haunted house) genre; a normally savvy distributer (Focus); decent reviews; and is based upon a well-regarded source novel.
I’m totally stumped.
“A.X.L.” doing a better PSA–on more than three times as many screens, no less–in its second weekend (after belly-flopping hugely last weekend) is simply astonishing.