4TH UPDATE/WRITETHRU SUNDAY AM after Friday and Saturday posts: For the third year in a row, Disney owned the slow post-Thanksgiving period. That’s thanks to Ralph Breaks the Internet, which, according to studio figures, drew $25.8M at 4,017 theaters, -54%. Gross-wise, Ralph 2‘s second weekend is slightly behind that of Disney’s previous Thanksgiving second weekend holdovers, Moana ($28.2M, -50%) and Coco ($27.5M, -46%). Total by EOD for Ralph 2 through 12 days should be $119.2M. Non-family audiences are showing up big at 44%, followed by 38% kids and 18% parents in weekend two, per PostTrak.
And if you though this weekend was slow, just wait for next: There aren’t any major studio wide releases. In the post-Golden Globes nominations period, it’s the indies who’ll look to make a mark: Focus Features’ has the limited release of Mary Queen of Scots, Neon has Vox Lux, Roadside Attractions’ has Peter Hedges’ Ben Is Back starring Julia Roberts, and Universal has the 25th anniversary re-release of Oscar winner Schindler’s List.
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Universal/Illumination’s The Grinch rebounded and stole second place away from MGM/New Line’s Creed II, $17.7M to $16.8M. The Dr. Seuss movie flew past the two-century mark with a running total of $203.5M, and joined other $200M+ domestic Seuss-grossing films as the first 2000 Grinch ($260M) and Illumination’s The Lorax ($214M). Second weekend exits for Creed II remained high with four-and-half stars and a diverse pull of 39% Caucasians, 35% African-Americans, and 18% Hispanic.
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Dropping hard at-62% is Warner Bros.’ Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald, with $11.2M in weekend 3. The sequel is clearly not up to snuff of the first movie in regards to audience response (B+ to A), and critical response (40% Rotten to 74% Certified Fresh). Creed II‘s second weekend is ahead of its 2015 predecessor ($14.9M), and its running total by Sunday of $80.7M is also raging ahead through 12 days by 25%.
Fifth place is 20th Century Fox/New Regency/GK Films’ Bohemian Rhapsody, which in weekend 5 is eyeing $8.1M, -42%, for a running total of $164.4M. The Freddie Mercury biopic is hitting a high note around the globe and passing the half-billion point.
Screen Gems‘ R-rated horror film, The Possession of Hannah Grace, with $6.5M over three-days, may not look so dazzling. But this $6M-budgeted title, with a $12M P&A spend, is good enough for Sony. The movie was a low-budget cash grab in the current slow marketplace and we’ve heard from finance sources that anything over $5.5M was considered to be a win for Sony internally. That said, don’t expect the movie to leg out that much. Critics weren’t kind, with a 27% Rotten Tomatoes score, and audiences weren’t over the moon with a C- CinemaScore and a (gulp) star and a half on PostTrak and a 37% definite recommend. In regards to Hannah Grace‘s CinemaScore, it’s down from Screen Gems’ late August 2016 hit Don’t Breathe (B+), but above this summer’s Slender Man, which did a D- and opened to $11.3M and finaled at $30.5M. Demos were 50/50 male-female, with nearly even quads all around, but with females under 25 leading: M25- (25%), M25+ (25%), F25- (29%), F25+ (21%). A mostly diverse draw in 43% Caucasians, 27% Hispanics, and 19% African-Americans.
Sony was always planning to launch a horror film this weekend, the previous title being the James Gunn-produced BrightBurn. In October, following the right-wing Twitter bash against the Guardians of the Galaxy director and his firing off the Disney/Marvel franchise, Sony gave BrightBurn some distance from that meshugaas and put the genre pic in a more warmer period, both weather-wise and financially on the calendar, opening Memorial Day weekend next year, May 24.
Shout-outs are in order for Universal/Participant Media/DreamWorks’ Green Book, which is looking to have one of the best three-day % holds of the weekend, -29% in its third go-round with $3.9M at 1,065. That’s positive word of mouth in effect (a huge 80% definite recommend in weekend 2 PostTrak exits with four and a half stars) and that should not be discounted. There are some who believe that after awards season, this Peter Farrelly-directed period movie legs out past $50M. Adults over 25 at 87% are attending, with 51% female/49% male. Diversity demos are 59% Caucasian, 18% African-American, 11% Hispanic, and 10% Asian.
Also doing well is Fox Searchlight’s expansion of The Favourite, which jumped from four New York and Los Angeles locations with a total of 34 new plays, including San Francisco, Dallas, Austin, Washington DC, Boston, Chicago, and Phoenix. The Rachel Weisz-Emma Stone-Olivia Colman movie made $1.1M in its second weekend, with a great per-screen of $32.5K (the best of the weekend). Saturday’s business was up 9%, with $404K over Friday’s $368K. That average is ahead of the second weekend of expansion of The Shape of Water, which went from 2 to 41 locations and yielded a $27.8K per theater. The Favourite is playing to both Art house cinephile audiences (Landmark West L.A., Camelview Scottsdale) as well as hipper, younger crowds (Alamo Brooklyn and San Francisco, Union Square NY, and Arclight Hollywood). For Searchlight, the results in mainstream houses like the River East in Chicago and the Boston Commons are gratifying, as they indicate the pic’s ability to potentially cross over and broaden its audience. The Yorgos Lanthimos-directed British period piece expands to 12 more markets next weekend, with an 80-100 screen footprint. Running total by EOD is expected to be $1.67M.
Orion’s teen musical Anna and the Apocalypse launched at five locations, with $50K-$51K over the weekend, an awful $10k-$11K per screen. .
Warner Bros. has the Nick Nolte movie Head Full of Honey, which is German director Til Schweiger’s remake of his 2014 film about a man suffering from Alzheimer’s who embarks on a final road trip with his granddaughter. The movie tanked with $9K on 4 screens at Lincoln SQ, Union SQ, ArcLight Hollywood & Landmark for a truly bad $2,2K screen average.
WEEKEND B.O. FOR NOV. 30-DEC. 2 |
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1ST UPDATE, FRIDAY 7:57AM: There’s only one new wide release this weekend and that’s Screen Gems microbudget R-Rated horror movie The Possession of Hannah Grace from helmer Diederik Van Rooijen, and last night from 1,866 locations, the movie made $625K from shows that started at 7PM.
Sony is expecting $3M for the weekend, however industry estimates think it could do $6M-$7M and that’s a great number we hear for this movie that cost around $6M and has an estimated P&A around $12M. The Possession of Hannah Grace, written by Brian Sieve and produced by Todd Garner and Sean Robins, follows Megan (Shay Mitchell) a cop fresh out of rehab who takes the graveyard shift in a city hospital morgue. A disfigured cadaver arrives and she begins to face a series of bizarre, violent events caused by an evil entity in one of the corpses.
Most of the major studios took off this weekend as far as wide entries because the post Thanksgiving-frame is typically a downer business wise as the holiday season ramps up and audiences become distracted. That said, genre tends to appeal to a certain size crowd, i.e. Universal’s Krampus during the post Turkey frame in 2015 which opened to $16.2M off a $15M production cost and went on to make $42.7M stateside.
In this scenario, Disney’s Ralph Breaks the Internet will continue to rule No. 1 in its second weekend with $31M, -45%, after a nine-day cume of $93.5M and MGM/New Line’s Creed II will continue to be No. 2 with a $20M, -44%, second outing following a $64.3M nine-day total to date. By Sunday, should Ralph 2 hit $124.5M, he’ll be pacing ahead of his first 2012 installment by 23%. Wreck-It Ralph made $189.4M in U.S./Canada and Ralph 2 could easily see over $230M.
Warner Bros.’ Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald ended its first week with $123.1M. It’s projected to earn $16M in its third weekend, -45%, for a running total by Sunday of $139.1M. That puts the J.K. Rowling written and produced Harry Potter spinoff 24% behind FB1 which ended its domestic run at $234M. If Grindelwald continues at this pace, it’s looking at around $177M.
Ralph was disappointing… they missed the mark.
Bradley Cooper still only gives 99%. He hasn’t broken through yet in terms of craft. He should not win for this. There is more to learn before he wins Best Actor.
If Widows gets nominated at the Oscars, people won’t forget its box office failure.
I’d love to see that happen, but sadly, it probably won’t. Popularity feeds Oscar nominations and too many other films this year already have that buzz.
Bohemian Rhapsody will reach $200 million. Like many, have seen it twice already and plan on seeing it again. Bradley Cooper’s performance in a Star is Born can’t hold a candle to Rami Malek’s. Malek will win the Oscar
It won’t get there before the Oscar nominations come out. Then it will get put back in theatres and get the final boost.
Not a chance. Bradley Cooper wrote, directed, produced, sang, composed, everything. It’s his time.
So he can get a directing award. His performance was a weaker copy of Jeff Bridges when he played a drunk country singer a few years back. His role was not that taxing. Malek has a much more physical and emotional ally demanding role. Star is Born felt like it was made by a piece of cold steel.
Bradley Cooper will likely win Best Actor. His performance is worthy too. Considering the critical beating that BR got, be happy that it made money…that’s likely the only reason Malek will get nominated.
Don’t be surprised if Christian Bale comes away with it at the end. His turn as Cheney is already getting rave words. Might come down to do they reward the turn as the beloved musician or the loathed political figure. Hollywood loves both but tend to go towards politics in the end.
The best performance of the year is undoubtedly Jack Black’s Nacho Libre.
“Bum bum bum bum bum bum.” – Nacho Libre
Have seen it at least 30 times and likely will again before the year is up.
So “Fantastic Beasts 2” will finish around 165 millions
“Fantastic Beasts 1” got 234 millions.
That’s a freaking 60 millions loss to the first movie. That means people don’t care about story, these characters and movie is not worth rewatching. And they plan to release 3 more movies about same boring characters and same story…..
What on earth were they thinking? It should have been trilogy. Third movie will probably open to 35 millions and have trouble reaching 100 millions. With budget over 200 millions.
They should reconsider their ridiculous plan. And finish story in third movie and be done. Otherwise they will just lose money. And pull Divergent style. By releasing third movie, ending on cliffhanger and not resolving story, see it flop and then studio will cancel it.
Too many movies released, Too many movies released… Bad release date..People are still broke… Home video is factor.. Family’s can only afford one movie..Ralph the box office…Black Friday sales through most of November suck up money… There will be many box office casualties by the end of December
You are wrong. COS dropped from PS (50 million domestically, 100 M WW), POA dropped from COS. It’s behavior we’ve seen before with other franchises. The sequel is always going to be more frontloaded. It’s still making bank overseas: flat in some, decreasing in others, increasing in others. It IS turning a profit in for WB, you can be sure of that, and that’s not counting all the merchandising, book sales (TCOG and FBAWTFF screenplays in best sellers lists), and everything else that trickles down to FBAWTFF and Harry Potter.
And it’s JK Rowling, this is the Harry Potter universe, this is Fantastic Beasts. It’s been very clear that Heyman and WB are 100% on board. Jo NEEDS 5 films, the actors were contracted for four and she is the one who requested that it was a 5 film arc. This ends in 1945 with the Dumbledore-Grindelwald duel, you have to go from 1927 in TCOG to 1945. An 18 year span, the third FB will jump ahead a few years but it’s not an arc you can just butcher and shorten. And this is not some random screenwriter/author. I have no doubt FB3 will rebound and get closer to FBAWTFF numbers. The far more dense and complex nature of TCOG compared to the more straightforward and simpler FBAWTFF means also that the reception is not as good, regardless of the film’s quality (which to me, and MANY others, is fantastic with great characters and a great story (which is not the same, you clearly have an agenda here) ). That comes with the territory.
Also, the screenplay for the third film is done, Heyman and Yates have read it, they’re going into preproduction now, it’s shooting next summer. NOTHING is changing that, just know that. And the five films are not going anywhere. Any risks taken with TCOG will pay off down the road.
Professional screenwriters wrote the HP movies. Rowling isn’t a screenwriter and yet is writing these movies alone. Unless a Steve Kloves type comes on board, this series is in trouble.
Not to mention TCOG also faces a lot more competition than FBAWTFT did (Ralph, Creed II, The Grinch holding very well vs Moana)
2 points to add to your pot, Box Office can go down with darker sequels this isn’t kid friendly like Ralph or Grinch and lets remember that Azkaban was the lowest grosser despite being the best book + film and this film is very Phoenix like in you can see the movement of pieces and characters.
Get better at math.