LEAWOOD, Kan.–(BUSINESS WIRE)– AMC Theatres® (NYSE:AMC) is excited to announce that as of today, July 31, just five weeks after the enrollment period commenced, the new AMC Stubs A-List frequent moviegoer program has enrolled more than 175,000 fully-paid members.
This initial surge in membership is well ahead of expectations. At the time of launch on June 26, 2018, AMC expected to hit 500,000 members one year from launch at the end of June of 2019, and 1 million members two years from launch, at the end of June of 2020.
A-List is a new premium VIP tier of the AMC Stubs loyalty program. Also as of today, July 31, the success of A-List has in turn helped push the current membership of AMC Stubs up to 15.8 million U.S. households.
From Adam Aron, AMC CEO and President:
“We are nothing less than ecstatic about the early consumer response to AMC Stubs A-List, which encourages moviegoers to come to the theatre more often, bringing their family and friends with them. With more than 175,000 members enrolled in just five weeks, the growth of AMC Stubs A-List has far exceeded our projections. We also find it reassuring that we consciously designed AMC Stubs A-List to be a profitable program with a price point that is loaded with consumer value while also being sustainable for us and for our guests.”
Aron added, “Because AMC Stubs A-List benefits our guests, our valued industry and studio partners, and our shareholders, we expect A-List will endure over the long-haul. Accordingly, we are excited to continue welcoming current and new AMC guests to enjoy AMC Stubs A-List, which offers the very best of AMC. A-Listers get a choice of every movie including the newest blockbusters, in every format including IMAX, Dolby Cinema and RealD 3D, at every U.S. AMC location, bookable online and in advance, with no annoying or unreasonable surge/peak pricing, up to three times per week, all for just $19.95 per month (plus tax).”
For information about AMC Stubs A-List and to sign up, guests can inquire at their local AMC Theatre, or at AMC’s web site www.amcstubs.com/alist, or on AMC’s iOS and Android smartphone apps after downloading or updating them with the latest app release.
LOS ANGELES(July 31, 2018)– Warner Bros. Pictures andScreenX,the world’s first multi-projection system that provides a 270-degree panoramic film viewing experience within a theatre setting, are expanding their ongoing partnership to release the epic, action-packed undersea adventure The Megin the immersive premium format. The film, from Warner Bros. Pictures and Gravity Pictures, dives into cinemas worldwide beginning August 10, 2018.
With the addition of this highly anticipated title, and following the global success of the ScreenX release of Rampage earlier this year, Warner Bros. Pictures and ScreenX are building on the promise of the previously announced slate of major motion pictures coming to theatres in ScreenX, including September’s terrifying new installment in the Conjuring franchise, New Line Cinema’s The Nun; director James Wan’s epic DC action-adventure Aquaman this December; and the first standalone feature for beloved DC hero Shazam! in April 2019, also from New Line Cinema.
“We’re looking forward to delivering this exciting slate of films in the immersive, innovative ScreenX format, and thrilled to team up with ScreenX again this August to bring audiences face-to-face with the biggest, most dangerous predator of all time in The Meg,” said Thomas Molter, EVP of International Distribution, Warner Bros. Pictures.
“Warner Bros. Pictures continues to be a strong partner, and we are thankful for their commitment to ScreenX as we look to expand the reach of this new technology, which we feel will change the theatrical experience for the better in the years to come,” said Byung-Hwan Choi, CEO of CJ 4DPLEX. “As the number of titles available in this format continues to grow, along with our number of locations around the world, all parties – from exhibitors to moviegoers – will continue to benefit from the innovative ways we are working together to create unparalleled movie-going experiences worldwide.”
ScreenX has quickly enhanced its international reach, successfully screening Hollywood blockbusters and local feature films alike, including a record three Hollywood blockbusters released in ScreenX in 2017. In the past 12 months alone, ScreenX has seen a surge in the number of ScreenX installed auditoriums, which have grown to 148, a more than 30% increase year-over-year. Additional screens are expected to be equipped with the unique technology across China, the U.S. and Europe in the coming months, expanding current total screens by more than 40% by the end of 2018. This includes the recently announced expansion with Cineworld Group in opening 100 locations across the U.S. and Europe.
On Monday, Incredibles 2 hit the $1 billion mark worldwide, becoming just the seventh animated film to do so after Frozen, Minions, Toy Story 3, Despicable Me 3, Finding Dory, and Zootopia. It is also just the fifth Disney animated film to cross the milestone.
Incredibles 2 has been a monumental performer since opening June 15, earning $574 million in North America and $430.9 million internationally to date. The sequel to 2006’s The Incredibles also boasts the largest domestic debut for an animated film ever with $182.7 million. Its global total stands at $1.005 billion.
Additionally, Incredibles 2 is the first animated film to hit $500 million in North America and the ninth highest-grossing film of all time.
Overseas totals for the Disney-Pixar release include $53.5 million in China, $45 million in the UK, $37.1 million in Mexico, $33.8 million in Brazil, $32.7 million in Australia, and $30.4 million in France. It has yet to open in several major territories, including Japan (Aug 1), Spain (Aug 3), Germany, and Italy (both September).
Breaking up is hard to do. It’s even harder if, say, your (former) partner is a globe-trotting secret agent who’s kept his identity secret from you. The scenario provides the springboard for Susanna Fogel’si, in which Audrey (Mila Kunis) has a scant moment to mend a broken heart when she finds herself embroiled in a deadly international conspiracy thanks to her ex-boyfriend. Finding herself on the run with her best friend, Morgan (Kate McKinnon), Kate has to avoid assassins in an adventure that takes her halfway around the world. Together they improvise their way through the world of international espionage, as they attempt to piece together the mystery they’ve unwittingly found themselves in. BOXOFFICE spoke with the Susanna Fogel, the film’s writer-director, on the experience of bringing this comedy-action thriller to the big screen.
How did the idea for this film originate?
I wrote this script with a friend of mine. We were always talking about how we loved action movies, bigger movies that were traditionally more male. As comedy writers, we wanted to do a movie that combined our sensibilities with our love for these big movies and, hopefully, write something that would require a theatrical release–unlike most of our smaller movies which are harder to get financed and aren’t necessarily an innately cinematic experience. So we wanted to write something that would demand that sort of big spectacle, like those fun movies we always love to watch.
How did you settle on the leads for the film, Kate McKinnon and Mila Kunis?
I had a relationship with Kate, who did a small role in my first movie, Life Partners. I had that relationship with her and immediately felt like she would be the perfect person to play Morgan, the more theatrical one of the two. Once we had Kate, the process was basically like casting a romantic partner in a movie, where you have to get the specific chemistry between two people, but it’s harder to guess on a platonic level what’s going to work.
We had a few actresses that we were thinking about, and Mila was the one who really felt like the most relatable. Most men and women really love her, can empathize with her struggles and insecurities without finding her annoying or pitying her too much. She’s so vibrant. It felt like that would be a good match for Kate’s more wide-eyed theatricality.
But both of them are so smart and down-to-earth, after meeting both of them, I felt like they would get along. I guess that they would. Luckily, it worked out. But that’s always tough, trying to guess about casting. It’s not until you first hear them rehearse that you know it’s going to be fine, that you’re not going to ruin the whole thing.
Throughout the film, you’re balancing these complex action sequences with a pair of comic performances. It’s a peculiar task–you don’t want to lean too much on either the action or the comedy–how did you approach that challenge?
It was important for me not to make the action into comedy itself. I think a lot of these comedies that have action in them, the comedy is the main event. They suffer from a lack of stakes in the actual action. They try to make it funny while it’s really violent. I think it shortchanges both the action and comedy, because the action feels a little less high-stakes, while the comedy feels a little inappropriate while all these people are dying. It’s kind of a delicate balance.
I tried to keep the action grounded; as intense and raw as the action in any action movie, then let the comedy come in between the action sequences. To accomplosh that, I hired Gary Powell, who’s served as a stunt coordinator on Bond and Bourne movies. I felt he would be the person to help me get the action sequences right. Then it was up to me to figure out where the comedy could come in between.
For that, it’s a matter of figuring out what feels grounded and real enough that you’re really owning the stakes of what you’re watching. When you watch an action movie, you need to feel like there’s real danger. At the same time, you don’t want your audience to be so disturbed by the violence that they can’t laugh at the next funny line. I think it’s a matter of choreographing the action so it feels fun but it’s not funny. If it feels fun, people will have a smile on their face. Then when they move them into a comedic scene in the next moment, they’re ready to laugh. They’re not feeling like it’s a huge giant tonal shift. But it is a delicate thing; I tried my best to marry the two tones.
The movie embraces a lot of the conventions from globetrotting spy movies, but it also diverts significantly when it comes to the roles played by Mila Kunis and Kate McKinnon. Women are usually depicted as either femme fatales, accessories, or trophies in these sort of movies. That’s not at all the case in this film; both the leads feel fairly grounded while being caught up in this absurdly dangerous situation–it leads to comedy without resorting to any cliches.
As a woman myself, it’s never a conscious choice to subvert gender expectations. It’s just the way I see my own world; through my own lens of being an unconventional woman who loves action movies and more traditionally male genres myself. I think there are a few different ways that women are portrayed in the genre. One is as an accessory and another is as this robotic tough girl kind of way, which also doesn’t feel real. Although it might seem, on the surface,as a feminist take on things, it also doesn’t ring true for me or resonate with how I feel in my life.
With this movie, we really wanted to show two women who were relatable and strong, but also not bionic women with no feelings. We wanted to show that in the real world, they’d be in these situations and they’d be noting the destruction that they were causing, they’d be wondering if they were doing the right thing, they would still care about their friend’s feelings. At the same time, they could be tough and strong. We really wanted to show women who are more than one thing; in these movies, men get to be a lot of different things, but women get to be just one. We simply tried to make space for well-rounded characters in general. The fact that they happen to be women, it only feels political just because we’re starved for that. It was less of a conscious choice and more about wanting to see women in these roles, because why not?
Kate McKinnon’s delivers a great performance. Her character is wacky and outlandish, but tinged with a very grounded sense of insecurity. The character’s better developed, where, yes, she does provide the comic relief–but it comes from a place of personal discomfort. There are real feelings there. How much of that came from your screenplay and how much came from the performance?
The comedy that resonates with me the most as an audience member is comedy that feels like it comes from a place of character and humanity. For me, no broad situational joke is ever going to feel as resonant as a joke that has some sadness behind it and some real human feelings underneath. There’s something about these very performative people that’s trying to compensate for something. There’s often something that makes them feel like they have to perform all the time. I was interested in showing that layer, in addition to just letting her show the world she’s a very funny person. The process of working with Kate and getting to know her was really profound, because she’s a really serious thoughtful person. She’s the opposite of the sketch comedian that you see on Saturday Night Live. In reality, she’s an introverted intellectual who’s very sensitive and more of a listener than a talker. Getting to know her a bit really inspired me to deepen the character more.
The script was a lot more joke-y before Kate came along. Contrary to what you might think, she actually brought it to a more real grounded place just by being herself and connecting to it. I think we ended up replacing some of the jokes that were in the script with these real Kate-in-the-moment character moments, that end up being some of the funniest moments in the movie. But they were just Kate reacting in an authentic way rather than delivering scripted lines.
Day to day, it’s a process because she’s also a writer, she’s so brilliant. Unlike the comedy that is just straight comedy, there wasn’t an unlimited amount of time because we had to shoot these more complicated sequences for her to explore things. It was a matter of creating enough parameters, but within that giving her a little bit of room to play. We ended up with some really nice funny human moments.
You’re a self-admitted fan of the action and spy genre. Are there any personal favorite titles from that list of films?
I get a lot of flak from people in my life for not having seen some of the classic action movies from the ‘80s and ‘90s. But I will see any Bond or Bourne movie. Those are the canonical movies for me. Obviously, the Mission Impossible’s are great. I think movies that have a bit of wit to them, but also action. I wanted to make a movie that had that much fun in it, that much spectacle, that much scope, that would be an adventure for the viewer. The more international globetrotting the movie, the more likely it is to inspire me. I feel like we all have that fantasy of wanting to get out of our element or our comfort zone.
In terms of other genres, I love movies about female friendships; movies like Bridesmaids and some of the Judd Apatow movies that are about men and show these real loving supporting friendships that are at the core of our lives.
With the comedy and the action sequences, this is the sort of movie that works best at a cinema. You mentioned earlier that you wrote the film specifically thinking about the movie theater experience. Why was it so important for you to make a film so suited for the cinema?
I’m part of a generation that grew up wanting to make movies. By the time we were in a position to do that, however, television had exploded into this world of possibility as movies were finding themselves crunched in the marketplace that was increasingly difficult and competitive. We all had to adjust our idea of what storytelling meant to us and what being a filmmaker meant. For me, I grew up really inspired by those mid-’90s independent films, wanting to make these small personal stories that would still come out in a movie theater. I started my career writing these movies and realizing that actually it was an almost insurmountable uphill battle to get those movies on the big screen. There’s so much oversaturation of content, the economics of movies has become really difficult when they’re competing with streaming. A good investment for a financier is a movie that feels like it has to be seen in the theater; those are the movies that people rush out to see, an experience that can’t be duplicated on Netflix.
Part of writing this was just trying to write something that would give me the opportunity to make a movie and have that exposure and that reach that I always dreamed about having. That was pretty impossible with these smaller independent movies I was writing before. For me, it was really wanting to reach that world. Knowing that I had to adjust my genre a little bit to do that, and embracing that was a big part of it. It definitely was a love for big movies in the theater, and also the realistic understanding that it requires a bit of analysis of what’s realistically going to end up on the big screen and what’s not–for better or for worse.
A quick glance at Shawn Levy’s filmography reveals the producer-director’s lifelong passion for science fiction—he’s been involved in some of the most influential sci-fi titles of recent years, including 2016’s Academy Award–nominated Arrival and the Netflix runaway hit Stranger Things. Levy’s latest sci-fi project, the big-screen adaptation of the young-adult novel series The Darkest Minds, will be making its way to theaters later this year. The Darkest Minds tells the story of the survivors of a mysterious disease that wipes out an entire generation of young people in a not-too-distant dystopic future. Those survivors emerge from the crisis with rare superpowers, becoming dangerous targets of a government that sees them as a threat to the status quo. Boxoffice spoke with Levy about his involvement in the project—and why he believes its themes are especially timely.
How did you come across this project?
I first became aware of this as an unpublished novel. This was a book in galley form that my company and I found roughly seven years ago, written by a young female novelist named Alexandra Bracken. The ideas in this book were truly compelling. It was a story about a world in which most kids have perished from a mysterious disease. Those young people who do survive are changed. The story is about this group of kids and adolescents, led by Ruby (Amandla Stenberg), who come to terms with their powers. But more importantly, they come to recognize and embrace their powers. The idea of young people in an adult world that has let them down was compelling to me seven years ago, and yet here it is phenomenally timely in 2018. It’s almost uncanny how topical and timely it feels in our current world. I optioned the book; I then sat back and saw the book become a best seller. We developed a screenplay, we found just the right director and cast, and here we are.
How did the production team come together to make this movie a reality?
Once we had a script that we felt strongly about, we knew that we wanted a director with strong visual instincts. Also someone who could tell this female protagonist hero’s journey in an emotional and rousing way. We met with a number of filmmakers, but Jen Nelson—who had never made a live-action picture—came in with such a strong vision that we knew she was the one. Jen is a really thoughtful and perceptive human being. She has an animation background that gives her an incredibly evolved visual instinct. We began the casting process with Jen. We always knew that we wanted the cast to reflect the diversity of our country and our world. We’ve ended up with this multicultural ensemble, with an African American female heroine, directed by an Asian American woman, and characters who are African American and Asian American and Caucasian and British. I like the fact that there’s no uniformity to how people are represented in Darkest Minds. It’s as varied as our world.
When I look at all these choices over seven years, it’s uncanny to me that we have a film about the power of young people rising up, led by and created by female creative voices, manifested with a multicultural cast of actors. It all feels like somehow we stumbled into choices that anticipated a cultural moment that we didn’t even know would exist. So it’s really taken us aback, how this movie which has gestated for over half a dozen years has come together in exactly the right way in this moment.
As a producer, why do you believe it’s important to bring out fresh, original, diverse voices, both on and behind the camera?
I feel like for a long, long time we’ve had one kind of voice and vision telling stories of how human life is. I just feel like when we as an audience fail to see ourselves and those like us on-screen, it has this accruing feeling of exclusion. That’s not right; that’s not compelling entertainment. What I’ve tried to do, especially lately with our film Arrival, our show Stranger Things, and our movie Darkest Minds, is two things. One: to pair character-anchored storytelling with genre like sci-fi, so all three of those things fall into that kind of overlapping description. Also to question the presumption that science fiction and genre stories have a white male protagonist. It was never a question that Arrival was going to star a female linguist and academic, or that Stranger Things is in many ways a kind of love story to the marginalized and the weird. Darkest Minds is similarly about diverse young people who have been kept quiet because their voices and their power were feared by the adult world.
I, for one, raising four daughters, am thrilled that from Black Panther to Get Out to Wonder Woman we are seeing popcorn entertainment undermine those long-standing assumptions about whose story it is. It should be everybody’s story. And I’m trying to be one of those storytellers.
You’ve ushered in hits for both home entertainment and theatrical exhibition. Why does Darkest Minds belong on the big screen?
You know, it is interesting that although I’ve got a career-defining phenomenon at Netflix with Stranger Things, I am a popcorn-and-movie-theater kind of filmmaker. I always have been; I always will be. There is a communal and collective experience that does not happen in our living rooms and bedrooms that I value immensely. There’s also the sheer scale of picture and sound that does justice to us as filmmakers in a way that laptops and phones can’t.
Darkest Minds is rich in ideas, but it’s equally rich in spectacle and action and visual effects. To experience those visual aspects of a film, one needs to be in a proper movie theater. While I know the world is changing, I certainly remain committed to that movie theater experience. I continue to make—and hope to keep making—stories that merit that big-screen, big-theater experience.
How did you settle on the look of Darkest Minds?
We wanted to avoid the gunmetal-gray desaturation of other YA [young adult] dystopian franchises. Darkest Minds is largely set in the natural world, not some futuristic monolithic urban setting. So the presence of nature, the presence of color, and the use of varied and saturated hues was always very important to Jen. Not only as a motif, because these kids have their powers categorized based on color, but in the storytelling style, which is rich in color and vista.
There was little fallout for the Mission: Impossible franchise, as the sixth installment Mission: Impossible – Fallout debuted to $61.5 million this weekend. In dollars, that’s the Paramount franchise’s highest opening, besting 2000’s Mission: Impossible II.
Adjusted for ticket price inflation, though, it’s almost the opposite story. It actually becomes the franchise’s second lowest opener, ranking only ahead of 2011’s Ghost Protocol. (And that was the only installment to open in December, a month when most films besides Star Wars traditionally open lower.)
Riding on a wave of sensational reviews, the sequel’s sizzling Rotten Tomatoes “Fresh” rating of 97 percent provided it an extra boost that created added excitement for moviegoers who have been promised what some critics have described as the best entry in the series yet.
55% of the audience was male, while 59% were over age 35. It’s also the series’ first installment to earn an “A” CinemaScore from audiences.
Coming in second is Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again, which dipped 57 percent in its sophomore frame to $15.0 million. That’s a significantly steeper drop than 2008’s first Mamma Mia!, which fell just 36 percent in its second weekend. Universal’s sequel has earned $70.4 million through its second frame, higher than the original through the same point in dollars but 13 percent behind when adjusting for ticket price inflation.
Last weekend’s top title The Equalizer 2 dropped to third in its sophomore frame, falling 61 percent to $14.0 million. That gives Sony’s R-rated Denzel Washington action sequel $64.2 million after two frames, putting it almost exactly even with the first Equalizer through the same point, although running 11 percent behind when adjusting for ticket price inflation. The film suffered stiff competition from the male-driven Fallout this weekend.
In fourth place, Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation had another decent hold, dropping 48 percent from last weekend’s total to $12.3 million. The Sony animated threequel now has a very good $119.2 million after three weekends (including previews for Amazon Prime members held prior to its wide release), the highest of the three installments through that point. However, it’s running a slight 5 percent behind Hotel Transylvania 2 when adjusting for ticket price inflation.
Opening a bit lower than expected in fifth place is Teen Titans Go! To the Movies, which debuted to $10.5 million. The animated feature – a spinoff of the Cartoon Network series (itself based on a DC comic book) – which made $4.25 million on Friday, including Thursday night previews. It proved more frontloaded than many had anticipated, suggesting the film’s core fanbase came out of the gate for the Warner Bros. Animation release.
The continued strength of both Hotel Transylvania 3 and Incredibles 2 also likely put a dent in the film’s earnings, as families with younger children looking for an animated movie may have opted for the more familiar titles. 41 percent of the audience was under age 18. On the plus side, the film earned a very good 93 percent “Fresh” rating on Rotten Tomatoes, which could give it legs in the weeks ahead.
Sixth place went to Disney-Marvel’s Ant-Man and the Wasp, which took in $8.4 million in its fourth weekend of release, a 49% decline. The MCU installment now has $183.1 million, surpassing the $180.2 million total of 2015’s original Ant-Man.
Limited Release:
After debuting in 14 theaters last weekend, the critically-acclaimed Blindspotting expanded to 523 locations with an estimated $1.3 million, giving it a so-so per-theater average of $2,533. The Lionsgate/Summit release’s total is $1.7 million.
Expanding to 158 theaters in its third weekend, A24’s Eighth Grade had another strong frame with an estimated $1.31 million, giving it a very good per-screen average of $8,339. The indie hit directed by comedian and YouTube personality Bo Burnham now has a total of $2.96 million and expands nationwide next weekend.
Overseas Update:
Mission: Impossible – Fallout opened with $92 million in 36 markets, led by South Korea with $24.6 million. The title’s global opening is $153.5 million, the best for the series yet. The film will open in China on August 31, and France (where it primarily takes place) on August 1.
Incredibles 2 just barely misses the billion dollar mark this weekend and should likely reach it on Monday. The title earned $20.0 million in 41 markets this weekend, takings its overseas total to $423.7 million and its global total to $996.5 million.
Studio Weekend Estimates (Domestic)FRI, JUL. 27 – SUN, JUL. 29
This week’s report takes a first look at the fall season’s first offering for kids and families, slated to open on September 21.
The House With a Clock In Its Walls Opening Weekend Range: $20 – 30 million
Jack Black and Cate Blanchett headline this adaptation from director Eli Roth, who makes the transition from R-rated genre films to a more family-friendly project. Early social media growth isn’t quite on par with that of September 2016’s Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children, although that could partly be chalked up to that film having benefited from director Tim Burton’s loyal fan base.
Jack Black will be a particular advantage for House thanks to his strong appeal among families coming off the successful first Goosebumps film and, more recently, Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle. Direct competition from Smallfoot one week later is notable when considering long-term prospects.
8-Week Tracking
Release Date
Title
3-Day Wide Opening
% Chg from Last Week
Domestic Total
% Chg from Last Week
Estimated Location Count
Distributor
8/3/2018
Disney’s Christopher Robin
$31,500,000
5%
$115,500,000
5%
3,500
Disney
8/3/2018
The Darkest Minds
$9,000,000
$28,000,000
3,000
Fox
8/3/2018
The Spy Who Dumped Me
$16,000,000
-3%
$57,000,000
-5%
3,000
Lionsgate
8/10/2018
Dog Days
$4,500,000
$13,000,000
2,500
LD Entertainment
8/10/2018
The Meg
$14,500,000
4%
$38,000,000
3%
3,200
Warner Bros.
8/10/2018
Slender Man
$21,000,000
$55,000,000
3,000
Sony / Screen Gems
8/15/2018
Crazy Rich Asians
$13,000,000
$42,000,000
Warner Bros.
8/17/2018
Alpha
$8,000,000
-6%
$22,600,000
-6%
Sony / Studio 8
8/17/2018
Mile 22
$16,000,000
7%
$50,000,000
14%
STX
8/24/2018
A.X.L.
$3,000,000
$7,500,000
Global Road
8/24/2018
The Happytime Murders
$15,500,000
-3%
$40,500,000
-4%
STX
8/24/2018
Searching
n/a
n/a
Sony / Screen Gems
8/29/2018
Operation Finale
n/a
n/a
MGM
8/31/2018
Kin
n/a
n/a
Lionsgate / Summit
8/31/2018
Ya Veremos
n/a
n/a
Pantelion
9/7/2018
God Bless the Broken Road
n/a
n/a
Freestyle Releasing
9/7/2018
The Nun
$40,000,000
$96,000,000
Warner Bros. / New Line
9/7/2018
Peppermint
$12,000,000
$33,500,000
STX Entertainment
9/14/2018
The Predator (2018)
$28,000,000
$65,000,000
Fox
9/14/2018
A Simple Favor
$14,000,000
$40,000,000
Lionsgate
9/14/2018
Unbroken: Path to Redemption
$2,000,000
$4,900,000
Pure Flix
9/14/2018
White Boy Rick
$7,500,000
$24,000,000
Sony / Studio 8
9/21/2018
Fahrenheit 11/9
n/a
n/a
Briarcliff
9/21/2018
The House with a Clock In Its Walls
$24,000,000
NEW
$79,000,000
NEW
Universal
9/21/2018
Life Itself
n/a
n/a
Amazon Studios
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Friday Update: Paramount reports this morning that Mission: Impossible – Fallout brought in an estimated $6.0 million from Thursday night’s opening shows at 3,300 locations, marking a strong start to the weekend. Here’s how that number stacks up against notable comparison titles:
19.8 percent ahead of War for the Planet of the Apes ($5.01 million)
39.5 percent ahead of Jason Bourne ($4.3 million)
9.1 percent ahead of Star Trek Beyond ($5.5 million)
Meanwhile, Teen Titans GO! to the Movies earned $1.025 million from its first shows, setting the stage for what should be a very healthy performance over the weekend. Comparisons:
13.9 percent ahead of The Emoji Movie ($900,000)
57.7 percent ahead of Captain Underpants ($650,000)
Check out Boxoffice’s weekend forecast for further analysis heading into the weekend, and follow us on Twitter throughout the weekend for further updates.
The final frame of July marks the sixth entry in Tom Cruise’s only career franchise (until next year’s Top Gun sequel, anyway) and the summer’s final all-animated release.
Momentum continues to build ahead of opening weekend as the sixth entry in the 22-year-old film franchise is riding a wave of incredible reviews. Social media growth has far outpaced that of Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation and fellow late summer action releases like Jason Bourne and Star Trek Beyond. Traditional tracking similarly points to a franchise-best opening weekend as awareness and interest levels continue to impress. With strong word of mouth expected, and a 3D price boost in overseas markets, a run beyond $200 million domestically and $700 million+ globally looks more than feasible for summer’s final tentpole release.
Teen Titans GO! to the Movies Opening Weekend Range: $15 – 23 million
Opening just two weeks after Hotel Transylvania 3 may cut into the target audience, but the existing brand and popularity of superheroes is expected to play to this film’s advantage — especially given its own strong reception thus far. Excluding next week’s Christopher Robin, this release has a clear run through the rest of summer with no direct competition through Labor Day. Twitter activity has been comparable to The Emoji Movie, although Facebook growth has been more modest.
Top 10
Boxoffice projects this weekend’s top ten films will earn $160 million or more at the domestic box office. That would mark at least a 19 percent growth from the same frame last year when Dunkirk led the market in its second frame over new releases Emoji Movie and Atomic Blonde as part of an overall $134.1 million top ten.
Top Three Trailers with Highest Recall Score Among Moviegoing Audiences
Moviegoers tell us the trailers they most recall seeing at their most recent visit to a cinema.
Mission: Impossible – Fallout(Paramount)
this Friday, July 27
32% of moviegoers (354 respondents) saw and recalled this trailer. That’s down slightly from its peak of 33% last week.
Tom Cruise returns for his sixth installment as secret agent Ethan Hunt, in an action-adventure trailer jam packed full of stunts, including one creating buzz because Cruise broke his ankle during filming.
Disney’s Christopher Robin(Disney)
August 3
29% of moviegoers (325 respondents) saw and recalled this trailer, its highest score to date. That’s up from 27% last week, its previous peak.
Ewan McGregor stars as a fatigued grown-up Christopher Robin, when his childhood friends Winnie the Pooh and the rest of the gang from the Hundred Acre Wood visit him again for the first time in decades.
Teen Titans GO! to the Movies(Warner Bros.)
this Friday, July 27
14% of moviegoers (157 respondents) saw and recalled this trailer, its highest score to date. That’s up from 13% last week, its previous peak.
The animated tongue-in-cheek take on the superhero genre follows five teenage sidekick superheroes — led by Robin of Batman fame — as they attempt to prove they’re as legitimate as their more famous counterparts.
Top Three Trailers with Highest Interest Among Moviegoing Audiences
Moviegoers tell us the wide release titles they’re most likely to see at a cinema, based on trailers recently played at theaters.
Mile 22 (STX Entertainment)
August 17
84% positive interest score, its peak to date. That’s up from 75% last week.
32% this week said they were “definitely” interested.
The sure-to-be-R-rated action thriller stars Mark Wahlberg as a CIA operative.
Mission: Impossible – Fallout (Paramount)
this Friday, July 27
Positive interest stands at 81%, its peak to date. That’s up from its previous high of 77% last week.
39% this week said they were “definitely interested.”
Slender Man(Sony)
August 10
Positive interest rises to 76%, its peak to date. That’s up from 72% last week, its previous high.
38% this week said they were “definitely” interested.
The horror title follows a group of high school female friends after one of them goes missing, seemingly taken by a mysterious alien-like creature known only as the Slender Man.
Trailer Impact is a service provided by Boxoffice Media parent company Webedia Movies Pro. To subscribe to the full service, which includes exclusive data about the top 25 trailers of the week, click here.
SAN FRANCISCO and KUWAIT, July 24, 2018 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Dolby Laboratories, Inc.(NYSE:DLB) and the Kuwait National Cinema Company (KNCC) have entered into a three-screen agreement for the first deployments of Dolby Cinema in Kuwait. The first site is expected to open later in 2018 at the 360 Mall in Kuwait City with KNCC operating under the Cinescape brand.
The news comes hot on the heels of recent announcements of upcoming openings in the UK with Odeon and with Kinopolis in Germany.
“We are really pleased to be able to continue to drive momentum in our strategy to expand the Dolby Cinema footprint in the Europe and Middle East region,” said Doug Darrow, Senior Vice President, Cinema Business Group, Dolby Laboratories.
“We’re delighted to be working with such a progressive leader in the region. Customers in Kuwait will now be able to experience the ultimate presentation for all genres of film. Dolby Cinema combines spectacular image, moving audio and inspired design to deliver a superior and immersive experience for movie-goers,” he added.
Each Dolby Cinema is equipped with the Dolby Vision laser projection system which delivers high dynamic range with enhanced color technology and a contrast ratio which far exceeds anything on the market today. The result is a dramatically different viewing experience that presents strikingly vivid and realistic images, making viewers feel like they are inside the movie’s world.
With Dolby Atmos, guests are transported inside the story with immersive sound that flows all around them, even overhead, creating breathtaking realism and a powerfully moving experience.
With Dolby’s inspired design, the Dolby Cinemas in Kuwait will provide customers with the ideal cinema environment from the entrance to the end of the film story.
Khaled Al Marzouq, Business Development Manager at KNCC commented: “We are committed to bringing our Cinescape customers the very best in movie entertainment and are really looking forward to offering Dolby Cinema: a more dramatic and engaging film viewing experience for cinema-goers, and the format beloved of Hollywood directors. We are really proud to be the first location in Kuwait to be offering film lovers this state-of-the-art film experience.”
The Event Cinema Association (ECA) has today announced the appointment of Grainne Peat to the role of Managing Director.
The ECA, established in 2012, is now an internationally recognised brand and the primary trade body for the Alternative Content sector. Event cinema content in multiple genres enjoys loyal and growing audiences and, with the support of the ECA and a managing director with a specialist focus, the opportunity for the sector to flourish further is clear.
Grainne has considerable industry experience, gained from her time spent at the UK Cinema Association, where she has been instrumental in driving forward a diverse range of policy issues, most notably in the areas of disability and access, security, skills and employment and sustainability. Grainne was the main lead for the Association’s networking events, including the annual conference which has become a key event in the industry calendar.
With support and resourcing from the ECA’s Board, Grainne will be responsible for the development of the association. Her role will be pivotal in meeting the ECA’s plans and objectives, ultimately to promote the Event Cinema sector and grow the support the association offers exhibition and distribution members.
“Grainne is a well-known figure in UK and European exhibition circles, not least for her positive engagement with a wide range of industry contacts and stakeholders but also her involvement on the UNIC Board and being a pioneering mentee on the UNIC Women’s Cinema Leadership Programme”explained Brad LaDouceur on behalf of the ECA’s Board of Directors, “Her advocacy on behalf of the cinema industry in recent years makes her the perfect candidate to magnify the ECA’s impact.”
Commenting on her appointment, Grainne said, “I am excited to be leading the ECA as it moves forward at pace – the association supports a culturally significant sector that is diverse, genuinely innovative, and frequently at the technical leading edge of cinema exhibition. I want to ensure that event cinema is a sustained and profitable element of the cinemagoing experience.”
You’ve added a number of high-profile exhibitors in 2018, what do these new business ties mean to the company?
We came out of the gates strong with Regal and AMC, launching nationwide in the summer of 2016. Obviously, they get a good share of the market covered, and we’ve been adding exhibitors, at least one a month, since then.
During CinemaCon we announced nine new exhibitors that were launched this summer, including Harkins Theatres. In the last year, we’ve rolled out everybody from ArcLight to Megaplex to National Amusements to Studio Movie Grill to Bowtie to B&B. You name it, the list is growing every day.
So we’re over 20,000 screens, and they’re 20,000 of the highest volume screens in terms of box office. It’s been really exciting, a testament to the fact that the product is resonating with exhibitors and consumers alike.
The first couple of conversations I had with Atom were about the technology and its potential. Now, we’re talking about a product and its footprint. What is some of the feedback you’ve heard, both from exhibitors and moviegoers, throughout the last year? Have there been any features that particularly connected with those segments?
We love new ideas. We love bringing more innovation. At CinemaCon, a lot of our conversations were around the concessions experience. Overall, the two features that have really resonated are social and concessions. Concerning social, it’s been about inviting friends or family members to come with you to the movies. From an exhibitor point of view, that takes a pragmatic dimension: can we get one extra visit a year? That could happen because you want to see the movie, or you might want to go because your sister is going. Either of those reasons will have you show up to the movie. That’s why our social feature has really resonated.
The second is the concessions piece. We have an amazing team; really good technology from Amazon, Google, Facebook–but you also have to be a little bit lucky. In our case, one of the key things that’s happened in the last two years is Starbucks and others–Dominos, Subway, McDonald’s–have launched pre-order products. So what it’s taught consumers is: you order, you pay on your phone, then you pick up. No more standing in line. We’re the ones bringing that to movie theaters.
We had this idea around the same time Starbucks was testing. We were in a couple small theaters, AMC and Regal locations in Ohio and Tennessee. We put up a small sign saying “Pick up here” and a little velvet rope so it felt VIP, but it was a really simple implementation. It started working; we saw more and more incidents of people buying concessions and greater basket sizes. On your app, it’s really easy to add one more thing to your cart. There’s no pressure to pick and move on from people in line behind you. You have all the time in the world to make your choices. It has really resonated with consumers and exhibitors who are seeing their concessions sales go up. We’re already doing it in over 200 Regal and about 50 AMC locations.
How much do you collaborate with users to roll out new features to the app?
The good thing about technology: technology is built to be optimized. So we’re learning things every day. Among our exhibitor partners, the General Managers are always the most helpful because they know what’s happening in the theater, they’re there every day. The GM’s said it would be great to have a “Prepare Now” button. Maybe you’re in the mall walking around and you’re about to come into the theater. So we said that’s a great idea, let’s go build it. About 60 days later, we had a ‘Prepare Now’ button. We tested it in a few theaters, it worked really well, so we rolled it out to the whole platform.
Millennials are a popular demographic when it comes to purchases from mobile apps, does that align with your user base?
Our average user is 27 years old, evenly split male/female. Very diverse,, only about 40 percent Caucasian. Which is to say we look a lot like the Millennial and the Gen Z population of the United States and Canada. That’s a point of pride and differentiation for us. We’re bringing incrementality amongst younger moviegoers. That is different than who you’ll see buying through other channels, like at the box office, other online ticket sellers, or through loyalty programs.
Atom Tickets is also a digital ticketing destination for event cinema. Have you developed any insights on usage of events through partners like Fathom Events?
We power the Fathom website for tickets, and I think it’s been a good partnership for both of us. It’s all about incrementality, helping people who want to go and see concerts or revivals or an opera at the movies. Part of the issue is not the content itself, it’s reaching the customers to make them aware of the content. We think we have a great platform to be able to do that.
As a third-party ticketer, what are some of the advantages that exhibitors can lean on by working with you?
The studios are putting great content up on the screen. The exhibitors, I think, are innovating where they should be innovating: adding better seating, adding reserved seating, adding upgraded food and concessions, adding bars. There is a concept in economics of comparative advantage. Focus on your speciality. We’re technologists.
For us, we want to be there from when a consumer thinks about going to a movie to when they enter the lobby. How do we make that a seamless experience? Then they get to their seat and maybe have their food delivered to them–no need to pull out a wallet, no need to stand in line. If we make it that much easier, could we get you to go one more time a year to the movies? If we could, based on 1.3 billion tickets sold last year, it would be a really big deal. That’s the simple goal. I come back to comparative advantage. We’ll focus on our piece, the exhibitors focus on their piece, the studios focus on their piece.
On the one hand, that’s no surprise: for the tenth weekend in a row, sequels and/or prequels dominated the top two spots at the North American box office. The surprise came with the order of the top two films. While Mamma Mia: Here We Go Again was widely expected to debut in first place, according to studio estimates it was narrowly beaten out by a stronger-than-anticipated opening for the action follow-up TheEqualizer 2.
Coming in a tad higher than the first Equalizer‘s $34.1 million, the Denzel Washington follow-up grossed an estimated $35.8 million on 3,388 screens. That far exceeded the studio’s expectations going into the weekend, as their conservative projections had it finishing in the ballpark of $25 million. While the follow-up had only a so-so average of 51% on Rotten Tomatoes, when it comes to male-driven movies of this ilk, critical notices tend not to matter as much. Indeed, opening day audiences awarded the R-rated film an “A” Cinemascore, suggesting that its target demo was more than satisfied.
Denzel Washington’s breakout turn as a former CIA black ops agent who comes out of retirement to avenge society’s ills echoes what Liam Neeson did with the Taken franchise, which similarly gave that actor a late-career boost as a bona fide action star. For comparison’s sake, Taken 2 debuted to $49.5 million in October 2012 vs. the first film’s $24.7 million, though its descent down the charts was considerably more rapid than its predecessor and it ultimately finished with a lower total in North America ($139.8 million vs. $145 million). Given that Equalizer 2 opened almost exactly in line with the first film in that series, it will be interesting to see if it can similarly top $100 million domestically by the end of its run. For the record, this is Washington’s fourth film with director Antoine Fuqua and their third hit, with the only misfire from the two being the Western revival The Magnificent Seven back in 2016.
Almost exactly ten years after the first Mamma Mia! debuted to $27.7 million, Universal’s Here We Go Again improved upon that film’s performance (even adjusting for inflation) with an estimated $34.3 million in its opening weekend. While an impressive total, that’s slightly below what many were predicting, allowing Equalizer 2 to sneak away with the weekend crown (at least according to estimates). Reviews for the sequel were much stronger than for the original (78% to 54% on Rotten Tomatoes), while the Cinemascore for both was an encouraging “A-“.
Given its higher opening weekend tally, it will be interesting to see how Here We Go Again holds up in the weeks ahead. The first Mamma Mia! was a leggy performer, never dropping more than 40 percent weekend-to-weekend in its first two months of release and ultimately finishing with $144.1 million in North America, representing a fantastic 5.2x weekend-to-final multiplier. Perhaps a more apt comparison for Here We Go Again would be 2015’s Pitch Perfect 2, which debuted to a massive $69.2 million but proved considerably more front-loaded than the first movie, ultimately finishing with $184.2 million and a 2.6x weekend-to-final multiplier. If Here We Go Again were to follow a similar trajectory, we’d be looking at a final gross somewhere in the range of $90 million, though it seems likely to reach the $100 million mark if the first film’s performance is any indication. Despite losing out on a No. 1 debut (though there’s a slight possibility that could change once final grosses come in tomorrow), this is a fantastic opening that proves the Mamma Mia! franchise is alive and well after a decade-long hiatus.
Last weekend’s champ Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation dropped 47 percent from its $44 million debut last weekend, bringing in an estimated $23.1 million in its sophomore frame and a strong total of $91 million after ten days. Though that’s a heftier dip than either of the first two films in their respective sophomore frames, HT3 has benefitted from strong midweek business given its release at the height of summer when most kids are out of school. Next weekend could prove to be a more competitive frame in terms of the family audience, as it will be contending with the release of Warner Bros.’ animated Teen Titans Go! To The Movies.
In fourth place, Disney-Marvel’s Ant-Man and The Wasp dipped another 44 percent to an estimated $16.1 million, giving the MCU sequel a healthy $164.4 million after three weeks of release. That puts the film roughly 24 percent ahead of the first Ant-Man at the same point in its run and within spitting distance of that movie’s $180.2 million final total. It should easily surpass that amount by the end of next weekend, as well as the lifetime totals of MCU stablemates Captain America: The First Avenger ($176.6 million) and Thor ($181 million).
Continuing strong in fifth places was Disney’s Incredibles 2, which took in an estimated $11.5 million in weekend number six. Easing just 29 percent from its performance last weekend, Disney-Pixar’s animated blockbuster now stands at a massive $557.3 million in North America, with still plenty of wind left in its sails.
Top Three Trailers with Highest Memorization Score Among Moviegoing Audiences
Moviegoers tell us the trailers they most remember seeing at their most recent visit to a cinema.
Mission: Impossible – Fallout
Paramount
July 27
33% of moviegoers (391 respondents) saw and remembered this trailer, its highest score to date. That’s up slightly from 31% last week.
Tom Cruise returns for his sixth installment as secret agent Ethan Hunt, in an action-adventure trailer jam packed full of stunts, including one creating online buzz because Cruise broke his ankle during filming.
Disney’s Christopher Robin
Disney
August 3
26% of moviegoers (310 respondents) saw and remembered this trailer, its highest score to date. That’s up from 22% last week.
Positive interest falls to 65%, its lowest level to date. That’s down from last week’s peak of 78%.
Ewan McGregor stars as a fatigued grown-up Christopher Robin, when his childhood friends Winnie the Pooh and the rest of the gang from the Hundred Acre Wood visit him again for the first time in decades.
Mamma Mia!: Here We Go Again
Universal
this Friday, July 20
23% of moviegoers (278 respondents) saw and remembered this trailer, tied for its highest score to date along with last week.
Positive interest stands at 58%, tied for its lowest level to date. That’s down slightly from 60% last week.
Lily James and Meryl Streep star in the musical sequel Based on the songs of 1970s supergroup ABBA, a decade after the original 2008 Mamma Mia! which was a leggy hit despite opening the same weekend as The Dark Knight.
Top Three Trailers with Highest Interest Among Moviegoing Audiences
Moviegoers tell us the wide release titles they’re most likely to see at a cinema, based on trailers recently played at theaters.
The Equalizer 2
Sony
this Friday, July 20
86% positive interest score, exactly even from last week. The peak of 87% was in mid-June.
58% this week said they were “definitely” interested.
15% of moviegoers (178 respondents) saw and remembered the trailer, its highest score yet and up from 13% last week.
The R-rated action sequel returns Denzel Washington as a retired CIA agent who dispenses bloody justice to his enemies.
Mission: Impossible – Fallout
Paramount
July 27
Positive interest stands at 77%, tied for its peak along with a week measured shortly after the trailer’s February release. It’s also up slightly from 75% last week.
6% this week said they were “definitely interested.”
Disney’s Christopher Robin
Disney
August 3
Positive interest falls to 65%, its lowest level to date. That’s down from last week’s peak of 78%.
37% this week said they were “definitely” interested.
Trailer Impact is a service provided by Boxoffice Media parent company Webedia Movies Pro. To subscribe to the full service, which includes exclusive data about the top 25 trailers of the week, click here.
This week’s report focuses on a handful of new releases slated to open on Friday, September 14.
The Predator Opening Weekend Range: $24 – 34 million
Fans of the franchise are eager to see what writer/director Shane Black (The NiceGuys, Iron Man 3, Lethal Weapon) can do with this latest revival of the series, the first since 2010’s Predators. What remains to be seen is how much mainstream interest can be generated over the next two months, particularly given the modest (relative to pre-release expectations) and front-loaded box office runs of Blade Runner 2049 and Alien: Covenant last year.
A Simple Favor Opening Weekend Range: $11 – 19 million
Anna Kendrick and Blake Lively headline this adaptation under the directorial wing of Paul Feig (Bridesmaids, Spy). Interest and awareness beyond established readers of the source novel aren’t quite on the level of past fall releases like The Girl on the Train and may not pick up until closer to release, but this could be a solid counter-programmer to watch for given the lack of high profile, female-driven films on the calendar between now and then.
Unbroken: Path to Redemption Opening Weekend Range: $2 – 4 million
Despite being a sequel to the successful 2014 film, there aren’t any high profile cast or crew connections carrying over to this sequel. Coming from distributor Pure Flix this time around, we’re expecting a run similar to their other titles for the time being.
White Boy Rick Opening Weekend Range: $6 – 12 million
Early award season buzz is driving early optimism for Yann Demange’s crime drama based on a true story, with Matthew McConaughey’s presence being a notable asset leading up to release.
