Maybe should stick with genre films? Up until this point, John Krasinski’s directorial career wasn’t much to speak of with the unremarkable David Foster Wallace adaptation, “Brief Interviews With Hideous Men,” and the “The Hollars.” The latter might be the poster boy for when someone describes, you know, a Netflix film. All that has changed, and Krasinski’s filmmaking career has essentially been minted this weekend with the success of his suspenseful horror movie, “A Quiet Place,” starring his wife Emily Blunt. “A Quiet Place” scared up an impressive $50 million this weekend at the U.S. box office– the second highest opening of 2018 after “Black Panther”– off a $17 million budget and no I.P. or major A-list stars to speak of. But the film earned praise from critics and audiences alike, the latter giving the movie a solid B+ Cinemacscore, so expect the movie to have legs.
READ MORE: John Krasinski Crafts A Dread-Inducing Horror Thriller With ‘A Quiet Place’ [Review]
Speaking of that Marvel juggernaut, ‘Panther’ surpassed James Cameron’s “Titanic” this weekend and became the third highest grossing film of all time domestically ($665.3 million). “Avatar” remains #2 with $760M, but ‘Panther’s just not going to get close to that next milestone. Still, the movie has had an astounding run and even the upcoming “Avengers: Infinity War” isn’t tracking as high for its opening weekend (though that could change). ‘Panther’ nearly hit the $1.3 billion mark this weekend worldwide and cracked the top ten for the highest grossing movies of all time worldwide. All this and “Black Panther” has still only been in theaters for eight weekends.
READ MORE: Steven Spielberg Returns To Pure Pop Escapism In Nostalgic ‘Ready Player One’ [Review]
Around the rest of the box office, Steven Spielberg‘s “Ready Player One” is still scoring wins, only falling -40% in week two and racking up another impressive $25 million to its domestic tally. Internationally, “Ready Player One” is off the charts, crushing “A Quiet Place” in competition and on its way to hit $400 million worldwide in a few days (currently stands $391.3M ww). The Kay Cannon-directed “Blockers” paled in comparison to “A Quiet Place,” but a $21 million opening would likely rule any other weekend and is a terrific start for a low-budgeted mainstream comedy that should have a lot of shelf life. The imaginatively-titled Entertainment Studios’ “Chappaquiddick,” posted strong numbers for a small indie without stars that resembles one of those mid-budgeted dramas from another era. In fact, it’s worth watching what ES is up to because this is their second movie in a row, after “Hostiles” (another movie that resembles the kind of mid-budget movie that’s largely left wide release aside from Oscar season), that’s put up good numbers. “Hostiles” quietly made $30 million while no one was watching. Faith-based sports drama “The Miracle Season” with Erin Moriarty rounded out the top 10 of new releases with $4.1 million.
In limited release, Amazon Studios’ “You Were Never Really Here” by director Lynne Ramsay scored the weekend’s highest per-screen average: $129K in three theaters ($43k PSA). A24‘s “Lean On Pete” did well in limited release as well: $50,118 on four screens for a $12.5K per-screen average.
Other notable changes around the box office included Wes Anderson’s “Isle Of Dogs,” moving into a moderately wide release and paying off. The animated movie had the second-best PTA in the top ten— $8,303 per in 554 theaters—and the movie has now hit $12 million total at home. Domestically, two blockbusters seem like they’re done for: “Pacific Rim Uprising” hasn’t been able to crack $55 million in three weekends and it just lost 1,000 screens. Universal is probably quietly letting this one go home, but overseas there’s still a little bit of hope thanks to China ($267M worldwide so far). “Tomb Raider” is toast too. After four weeks, it stands still at $55 million, and it dropped a whopping 60% in its fourth weekend. The same narrative befell “Red Sparrow,” and the picture fell far short of even $50 million in the U.S.
1. A Quiet Place – $50,000,000
2. Ready Player One – $25,060,000 ($96,920,525)
3. Blockers – $21,439,000
4. Black Panther –$8,430,000 ($665,355,740)
5. I Can Only Imagine – $8,356,800 ($69,084,002)
6. Tyler Perry’s Acrimony – $8,065,000 ($4,020 $31,349,580)
7. Chappaquiddick – $6,200,000
8. Sherlock Gnomes – $5,600,000 ($33,898,061)
9. Pacific Rim Uprising – $4,910,000 – ($54,919,060)
10. Isle Of Dogs – $4,600,000 ($12,048,934)
