As movie studios try to figure out how make their films critic proof, they can at least rest assured horror movies will always bring audiences out no matter the reviews. And this weekend, moviegoers wanted to get scared.
“Annabelle: Creation” led the pack at the box office, hauling in $35 million. It’s slightly under the $37 million launch of its predecessor, but ‘Creation’ fared much better with critics, and with a low budget of $15 million its going to earn a decent buck for New Line. Even more, this is a franchise with strong appeal overseas — “Annabelle” earned $172 million internationally — and it’s a strong bet the sequel will repeat that global success. Needless to say, this a healthy addition to “The Conjuring” cinematic universe.
Open Road found out the hard way that no one cares about “The Nut Job.” The original animated film did a decent, but not spectacular $19 million in its opening weekend on its way to final total of $120 million worldwide. “The Nut Job 2: Nutty By Nature” probably won’t even get close to that. The movie launched with a dismal $8.9 million from over 4,000 screens. Reviews for the film were atrocious, and the studio marketing seemed lacklustre at best, almost as if they knew they had a dud on their hands. Consider this one roasted.
Meanwhile, Lionsgate didn’t fare much better with “The Glass Castle.” The drama starring Oscar winner and future Captain Marvel Brie Larson, and based on a hugely popular best-selling book, could only manage $4.8 million, for a ninth place position in the top ten. Reviews were divided, and this is simply a case of first rate source material, a rising star, and a talented filmmaker in Destin Daniel Cretton, simply missing the mark. Everyone involved will recover and move on to better things, but it’s shame they couldn’t make this work.
In its second week, it looks like “The Dark Tower” is fairly done in the U.S., however it only faced a low 58% drop which is very good for a tentpole of this size. Still, it’ll be lucky if it can cross $70 million. Globally, the story isn’t much better. There’s lots of international territories to come, but unless there is significant boosts by the U.K., France, Mexico, Japan and China, its goose is cooked and Sony’s going to take a major loss on the picture. Faring slightly better as a similar flop is “Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets” which has hit $90 million worldwide to far.
In limited release, “Ingrid Goes West” took the crown, with $141,216 on three screens, for a per-screen average of $47,072. Coming in close behind was the Safdies‘ “Good Time” starring Robert Pattinson, pulling in $137,625 for a good per-screen average of $34,406. Other films at the arthouse holding their own included “The Trip To Spain,” “Once Upon A Time,” “A Taxi Driver,” and “Toilet: Ek Prem Katha.”
In box office milestones, “Spider-Man: Homecoming” crossed the $300 million mark domestically and Sony released a cheering rah rah rah PR email about it. ‘Homecoming’ looked like it might underperform at one point, but the picture is now at $702 million worldwide and China and Japan could easily put the picture over the $800M mark. Meanwhile, the modestly-budgeted “Baby Driver” from director Edgar Wright crossed the $100 million mark domestically and intercontinental territories could take the movie towards the $200 million mark or so — these are fantastic numbers for this kind of film.
With $363 million to its name, Christopher Nolan‘s “Dunkirk” is certainly zooming past the $400 million mark and then some. It’ll likely land in the top five of the highest grossing war movies of all time. Lastly, the very random “Wolf Warrior 2,” a Chinese release featuring all Asian actors aside from Frank Grillo has done gangbusters box office business. It’s become the highest grossing film in China ever and has hit a whopping $685 million in the country alone, which makes it the eighth highest grossing movie of 2017 so far. In North America, the actioner hasn’t even surpassed $2 million. Those are insane numbers and you can bet Grillo will kill to star in the sequel.
1. “Annabelle: Creation” — $35 million
2. “Dunkirk” — $11.4 million ($153.7 mil.)
3. “The Nut Job 2: Nutty By Nature” — $8.9 million
4. “The Dark Tower” — $7.8 million ($34.3 mil.)
5. “The Emoji Movie” — $6.58 million ($63.5 mil.)
6. “Girls Trip” — $6.52 million ($97.1 mil.)
7. “Spider-Man: Homecoming” — $6.1 million ($306.4 mil.)
8. “Kidnap” — $5.2 million ($19.3 mil.)
9. “The Glass Castle” — $4.8 million
10. “Atomic Blonde” — $4.5 million ($42.8 mil.)