For more than 15 years studios have done their best to avoid releasing their new movies on the second weekend of a Marvel movie. This weekend we learned the reason why. Read on for the weekend box office report.
As expected, Ryan Reynolds and Hugh Jackman‘s “Deadpool and Wolverine” won its second weekend in a row, topping the box office with an estimated $97 million, down 54% from its record-setting opening weekend. Not only did “Deadpool and Wolverine” cross the $300 million milestone domestically this past weekend, but with $395.6 million grossed in North America, it’s only a day away from hitting the $400 million benchmark, so the race is on to see if it can catch up to Pixar’s “Inside Out 2.”
Globally, the movie has passed the $800 million mark, adding another $110.5 million overseas this weekend for an international total of $428.5 million. With $824.1 million global, it has already passed the worldwide grosses of 2016’s “Deadpool” and 2018’s “Deadpool 2,” after just two weeks.
Warner Bros. decided to take its chances by releasing the high-concept thriller “Trap” from M. Night Shyamalan into 3,181 theaters, with Josh Hartnett, fresh off of last year’s “Oppenheimer,” playing a father taking his daughter to a concert that’s actually an FBI trap for a serial killer.
Warner Bros. chose not to screen the movie in advance for most film critics, which may have put many of them on the offensive when they had to pay to see the movie. That led to a pretty bad 47% on Rotten Tomatoes, as many reviewers had their knives out due to that corporate decision.
After making $2.2 million in Thursday previews, “Trap” wound up with $6.7 million on Friday (including those previews), and it ended up opening in third place behind “Twisters” with $15.6 million, averaging under $5,000 per location. The movie only cost $30 million to make, but it still needs to do decent business overseas to be profitable. “Trap” also received a “C+” CinemaScore, which is par for the course for horror and thrillers, as the hit “Longlegs” received the same audience score but continued to rack up business.
“Twisters” held up well with $22.7 million (down 35%), to take second place, bringing its domestic total to $195.6 million. It should pass the $200 million mark sometime in the next week, which would make it the fourth movie this summer and fifth movie this year to hit that mark.
Last week DreamWorks Animation’s “Despicable Me 4” became the fourth movie in the animated franchise to cross the $300 million mark, taking fourth place this weekend with $11.3 million, down just 23%, to bring its North American total to $314 million. It grossed another $26.9 million overseas this weekend to bring its international total to $438.3 million and global total to $752.2 million.
Pixar Animation’s own sequel, “Inside Out 2,” dropped just 19% to fifth place with $6.7 million. It has grossed $626.9 million domestically, which makes it the 12th highest-grossing movie domestically of all time. It’s slowly creeping up on last year’s mega-blockbuster “Barbie,” which ended up with $636.2 million domestic. Overseas, it added another $20.5 million, including a $4.9 million debut in Japan, so that brings its international total to $928.2 million and global total to $1.55 billion.
With two animated blockbusters still doing so well, it didn’t leave much room for Sony’s own family film “Harold and the Purple Crayon,” based on the popular children’s book by Crockett Johnson. Starring Zachary Levi, Zooey Deschanel, and Lil Rel Howery, Sony released the movie into 3,325 theaters on Friday, despite receiving terrible reviews with 28% on Rotten Tomatoes. The movie made just $725,000 in Thursday previews and $2.5 million on Friday, including those previews, ending up with an estimated $6 million for the weekend, opening in sixth place. It also only made $3 million overseas in 32 markets, so yeah, Sony may have been wise in the decision to delay the movie for a year, though it did receive an “A-” CinemaScore, so clearly, families with small kids enjoyed it more than critics.
Osgood Perkins‘s horror-thriller “Longlegs,” which has become distributor Neon’s biggest blockbuster hit to date, added another $4.1 million this weekend to take seventh place, with $66.9 million domestic. The Nicolas Cage-starrer is creeping up on A24’s 2024 hit “Civil War,” as well as George Miller‘s “Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga,” both of which it should pass sometime this week.
Two indie movies getting a slow roll-out added more theaters, with Sean Wang‘s “Dìdi (弟弟)” taking in $440,000 this weekend in 47 locations, to bring its domestic total to $728,000. The Colman Domingo prison drama “Sing Sing” added another $173,000 in 18 locations to bring its total to $535,000. Both movies are expected to expand nationwide on August 16.
Almost two-thirds of players in the box office prediction game had Shayamalan’s “Trap” opening in second place and “Twisters” taking third, but it turned out to be the other way around. And roughly 110 players had “Harold” opening in the top five, which was also not the case. On the other hand, 90 players (roughly two-thirds) did have “Deadpool” winning the weekend with between $75 and $100 million, so that will help our users’ prediction scores.
The July 26 game had one of the best showings in a long time with 118 players getting all six predictions correct, but “dean317” and “DanC” were tied with the most points (49,450) with “Robert Chardello” just behind them.
On Friday Blake Lively stars in the romantic drama “It Ends With Us,” which will make a concerted play to dethrone her husband Ryan Reynolds’s blockbuster movie. You can read more about that in Wednesday’s weekend preview.
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