Solo: A Star Wars Story may have topped the North American box office again, but its sophomore frame was anything but rosy.
Disney’s would-be blockbuster tumbled 65 percent in weekend two, grossing $29.3 million and bringing its domestic total to $148.9 million after ten days. While that kind of second-weekend drop is generally expected for a Memorial Day weekend opener – X-Men: Days of Future Past, X-Men: Apocalypse, and Fast and Furious 6 all had declines north of 60 percent – it’s more problematic for a film that fell way short of expectations in its first go-round. It’s now pacing nearly 48 percent behind the first Star Wars anthology film Rogue One, which took in $286 million in its first ten days.
After opening to a weak-for-Star Wars $84.4 million over the three-day period last weekend ($103 million four-day), Disney was clearly hoping for a better hold here. Unfortunately, at this pace Solo won’t go much higher than $200 million in North America by the end of its run, which is fairly disastrous for a live-action franchise with this kind of pedigree. Indeed, the lowest-performing entry prior to this was 1980’s The Empire Strikes Back with $209.3 million, but that film’s inflation-adjusted gross comes in at a massive $640 million (not including its 1997 re-release). For a franchise that just a few short weeks ago was seen as a can’t-lose proposition, Solo‘s performance will no doubt prompt some executive soul-searching over at Disney in the run-up to the release of Episode IX next December.
Finishing in the runner-up position for the second weekend in a row, Fox’s Deadpool 2 brought in $23.3 million in its third frame, representing a decline of just 46 percent from the last Friday-Sunday period. That brings the foul-mouthed sequel’s gross to $254.6 million after ten days of release, putting it roughly 10 percent behind the pace of the first film. That’s an impressive total for the follow-up, particularly given the still-strong competition from Avengers: Infinity War and the fact that Solo came so swiftly on its heels. At this pace, it should finish in the $300 million range by the end of its run and will rake in even more overseas.
Luckily for Solo, the promise of a blockbuster run scared off the competition early, meaning the studios gave the Star Wars installment a wide berth for fear it would gobble up everything in its wake. That meant that only three lower-profile films dropped this weekend, none of which registered particularly strongly. The best performer of the lot was STX’s Adrift, which brought in a so-so $11.5 million in third place. Starring Shailene Woodley and Sam Claflin as a young couple who become stranded in the middle of the Pacific during a hurricane, the film received mixed reviews and a “B” Cinemascore.
Adrift came in slightly below the studio’s expectations but opened similarly to the sleeper success 47 Meters Down, which debuted in mid-June last year and ended its run with a $44.3 million off a bargain $5.5 million budget. Unfortunately, Adrift reportedly cost $35 million to produce, so it needed to open much higher this weekend to justify its price tag. Even if it declines similarly to 47 Meters, which boasted strong holds in the 30-40 percent range over its first several weekends, this one is looking like a loss for STX.
Performing much stronger relative to its budget was BH Tilt’s micro-budget sci-fi/horror release Upgrade, which grossed a better-than-expected $4.4 million in its debut frame. Written and directed by Saw and Insidious co-creator Leigh Whannell, the film opened in a relatively scant 1,457 theaters, giving it a decent per-screen average of $3,059. Upgrade was helped along by largely positive reviews (it currently has a “Fresh” rating of 85 percent on Rotten Tomatoes), and its Audience Score of 90 percent there indicates it could be buffeted by positive word-of-mouth in the coming weeks. For comparison’s sake, this opening is similar to BH Tilt’s The Belko Experiment from last March, which ultimately went on to gross north of $10 million on a $5 million budget.
The final opener this weekend, Paramount’s Action Point, sputtered out of the gate with a measly $2.3 million, below even the most conservative industry expectations. Released in over 2,000 theaters and produced on a reported budget of $19 million, the Johnny Knoxville comedy had a per-screen average of just $1,131, making it one of the worst wide debuts of the year. Though billed as being “from the star of Jackass,” the film couldn’t come close to matching the three official big-screen Jackass installments, which debuted to $22.7 million, $29 million, and $50.3 million, respectively. It also paled in comparison to Jackass Presents: Bad Grandpa, which opened to $32 million back in 2013.
With a Rotten Tomatoes score of just 17 percent, Action Point also fared poorly with critics, which certainly didn’t help its momentum going into the weekend. Though Knoxville has always struggled to make an impact outside the Jackass franchise – only 2005’s The Dukes of Hazzard and The Ringer managed to draw a sizable audience – this appears to represent a new commercial low for the actor.
Dropping to fourth place in its sixth weekend, Avengers: Infinity War added an estimated $10.4 million, giving it a total of $642.9 million in North America to date. Currently sitting in sixth place on the list of all-time domestic grossers, the Marvel blockbuster should soon surpass Jurassic World and Titanic for fourth place on the chart. It won’t get any higher than that, however, as number three on the chart – fellow MCU entry Black Panther – currently sits at nearly $700 million. Though Infinity War has outperformed Panther overseas, in North America it won’t be able to match that film’s jaw-dropping total.
In fifth place, Paramount’s successful counter-programmer Book Club grossed an estimated $6.8 million in its third weekend, giving it a healthy total of $47.3 million after 17 days of release. Seventh went to the Melissa McCarthy vehicle Life of the Party, which took in $3.4 million in weekend number four for a total of $46.3 million. That was followed in eighth place by Breaking In, which grossed an estimated $2.8 million for a total of $41.3 million in its fourth weekend, while tenth went to Lionsgate/Pantelion’s Overboard, which grossed an estimated $1.9 million in its fifth weekend. The Anna Faris-Eugenio Derbez comedy has banked an estimated $45.5 million to date and is now Latino-focused studio Pantelion’s highest-grossing film of all time.
Limited Release:
The Orchard released the true crime comedy-thriller American Animals this weekend and grossed an estimated $140,633 on just four screens, giving it a fantastic per-screen average of $35,158. Starring Evan Peters, Barry Keoghan, Blake Jenner, and Jared Abrahamson as four young men who attempt to pull off a high-stakes art heist, the film has been Certified “Fresh” at Rotten Tomatoes with a score of 84 percent. It will expand wider in the coming weeks.
Overseas Update:
Solo: A Star Wars Story grossed an estimated $30.3 million overseas, another weak result that gives it a total of $115.3 million internationally and $264.2 million worldwide. While Disney reports that the film posted strong holds in overseas markets including Europe (down 34 percent), there’s no covering up for the film’s disappointing performance across the globe. Totals for the film now stand at $18.6 million in the UK, a very disappointing $14.7 million in China, and $9.8 million in Germany.
Avengers: Infinity War continued its sizzling run internationally with an estimated $24.3 million this weekend, including $13.2 million in China where it finished as the top Western release in the country for the fourth weekend in a row. The MCU release now has a massive $356.2 million in China, making it the third highest-grossing Western release of all time in the country and the highest-grossing Marvel release ever. Infinity War now boasts an international total of $1.322 billion and a global total of $1.964 billion. It should soon become the fourth film to hit the $2 billion mark worldwide, joining a club that counts only Avatar, Titanic, and Star Wars: The Force Awakens among its ranks.
The post Studio Weekend Estimates: ‘Solo: A Star Wars Story’ Plummets to $29.3M; ‘Deadpool 2’ Holds Steady in 2nd w/ $23.3M; ‘Adrift’ Treads Water in 3rd w/ $11.5M appeared first on BoxOffice Pro.
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