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Box Office: ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ Rocks With $50 Million

20th Century Fox

Mixed reviews and a notoriously troubled production couldn’t stop Queen biopic “Bohemian Rhapsody” from blasting to the top of the box office.

Its $50 million first weekend take is even better than that of Oscar hopeful “A Star Is Born,” which debuted last month with $42 million. But it couldn’t top another music biopic, 2015’s “Straight Outta Compton,” which bowed with $60.2 million.

Rami Malek drew unanimous praise as Queen frontman Freddie Mercury, but many critics unfavorably compared it to parody music biopic “Walk Hard.” Ouch. Audiences, however, gave it an “A” CinemaScore and a glowing 96% rating on Rotten Tomatoes.

Disney: “The Nutcracker and the Four Realms”

Disney’s family film “The Nutcracker and the Four Realms” landed in second place with a disappointing $20 million from 3,766 venues. The movie reportedly cost $125 million to make.

Paramount: “Nobody’s Fool”

Also coming in under expectations: “Nobody’s Fool,” starring Tiffany Haddish. Tyler Perry‘s first R-rated comedy only generated $13.7 million from 2,468 screens.

Focus: “Boy Erased”

Playing in limited release, gay conversion drama “Boy Erased” racked up an impressive $220,000 at only five theaters in New York, Los Angeles, and San Francisco. It boasted the best screen average of the weekend: $44,000 per location. Lucas Hedges stars in the film, which expands to 75 theaters next weekend.

Here are the top 10 weekend estimates for November 2-4

1. “Bohemian Rhapsody,” $50,000,000
2. “The Nutcracker and the Four Realms,” $20,000,000
3. “Nobody’s Fool,” $14,000,000
4. “A Star is Born” (2018), $11,100,000
5. “Halloween” (2018), $11,015,000
6. “Venom” (2018), $7,850,000
7. “Smallfoot,” $3,805,000
8. “Goosebumps 2: Haunted Halloween,” $3,700,000
9. “Hunter Killer,” $3,525,000
10. “The Hate U Give,” $3,400,000

[Via Variety, Box Office Mojo]

November 4, 2018
How ‘Conjuring 2’ and ‘Now You See Me 2’ Bucked the Box Office’s Sequel Fatigue

2016 has been a disappointing year for sequels at the box office, from “Zoolander 2” to last week’s “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows.” With two more of them out this weekend — “The Conjuring 2” and “Now You See Me 2” — there was a lot of talk that both movies would tank as well, that sequel-itis had set in for good.

Yet “Conjuring 2” outperformed expectations, topping the chart with an estimated $40.4 million, just a hair shy of the $41.8 million debut of the original “Conjuring” three years ago. And “Now You See Me 2,” for which predictions ran as low as $16 million, opened with an estimated $23.0 million. That’s below the $29.3 million debut that made the first “Now You See Me” a surprise hit three years ago, but it’s still at the high end of expectations. It’s also just $1.4 million below the premiere of “Warcraft,” the highly anticipated online game adaptation, which debuted in second place with an estimated $24.4 million.

Why are there so many sequels this year — 17 in wide release so far? Why are most of them failing? And why are a few, like this weekend’s newbies, bucking the trend?

The usual reason cited for the abundance of sequels is Hollywood’s aversion to risk. Properties that already have name recognition in the marketplace and at least some proven fan base seem less risky than original scripts. Indeed, of this weekend’s top 13 movies, seven are sequels, four are adaptations of previously existing titles, and only the two at the bottom of the list (“The Nice Guys” and “Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping“) are original screenplays.

Nonetheless, even sequels have to start with an original idea somewhere. It’s worth remembering that “Now You See Me” was an original screenplay, and so was “Neighbors” which spawned the current No. 11 film, “Neighbors 2: Sorority Rising.” Someone at the studios took a chance on both of these ideas a couple years ago, and the gamble paid off, not just by launching a hit, but by launching a franchise.

And that’s the business the studios are in now: not the sequel business, but the franchise business. Even before this weekend’s results were in, it was clear that there were likely to be a third “Conjuring” and “Now You See Me” in the pipeline. Not every franchise can be “Star Wars” or the Marvel Cinematic Universe, but no title will rest until the studio behind it has milked every last drop of spinoff possibility out of it.

Conversely, this is a reason why Hollywood doesn’t make more movies like romance “Me Without You” (in sixth place this week). Doesn’t matter that the film cost just $20 million to make but has grossed $36.8 million here and another $18.4 million abroad. There’s no sequel possibility for this or most other movies that center on romance (notable exceptions: “Twilight” and “Bridget Jones’s Diary,” whose long-awaited third installment is due this fall).

It’s not because of Hollywood sexism (or at least, not just because…). After all, horror movies lend themselves well to franchises, and they tend to appeal primarily to women. “Conjuring 2” star Patrick Wilson has earned a following by starring in two horror series (“Insidious” is the other).

Of course, it helps if the sequels are actually good. Most of this year’s flop sequels got terrible reviews and weak word-of-mouth. “Conjuring 2” actually got pretty good reviews for a horror movie and earned an A- grade at Cinemascore, indicating very strong word-of-mouth. Critics. We’re much harsher on “Now You See Me 2,” but audiences gave it an A- as well.

It also helps if the sequels are cheap to make. “Conjuring 2” cost a reported $40 million, which is a lot for a horror movie (the first “Conjuring” cost half that) but a relative bargain by summer blockbuster standards. Given its $40.4 million domestic debut, plus the $50.0 million the movie has already made abroad, it’s more than justified its cost. Similarly, “Now You See Me 2” cost a reported $90 million, still low for a summer popcorn movie. Even so, with only $45.8 million earned worldwide so far, the magician caper sequel is looking like a much bigger gamble than the paranormal investigator sequel.

It’s where the sequels’ budgets climb into the nine figures that the math starts to become questionable, as this column noted regarding the new $135 million “Turtles” movie last week and the $170 million “Alice Through the Looking Glass” two weekends ago. These days, with marketing and distribution costing as much as production, and with theaters taking about half the grosses, a movie’s worldwide earnings have to be about four times its budget to break even. So any movie that costs $125 million to produce has to gross more than half a billion to be profitable. That’s a tall order for most sequels.

But then, that’s where the final piece of the puzzle comes in, which is the overseas market. Lately, studios have been far too reliant on foreign grosses to make up for weak domestic sales. Nonetheless, audiences abroad tend to be more forgiving of sequels, more eager to see movies in 3D, and more tolerant of movies that rely more on spectacle than dialogue or character development.

Take the new “Warcraft,” for example. (Not a sequel, of course, but still an adaptation of a familiar property with a built-in worldwide fanbase.) It cost a reported $160 million to make and earned less than $25 million here. But it earned $156 million in its China debut this week, beating the record set there last summer by “Furious 7.” Already, the fantasy game adaptation has grossed $286.1 million around the world, with 92 percent of its sales coming from outside North America. At this rate, the movie should ultimately turn a profit, even at a global break-even point of $640 million, and ensure that Universal’s plans for a “Warcraft” franchise move ahead, no matter how little American audiences or critics cared for the initial installment.

It’s at this point where the studios’ sequel math begins to make sense. They’re going to keep turning movies (and books, and video games) into franchises, no matter how few of them please reviewers or audiences here. Because they’re not making them for us.

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June 13, 2016
7 Reasons Why ‘TMNT2’ Stumbled at the Box Office

Welcome to the first really bad weekend of the summer. Even though this weekend saw three new wide-releases, it’s still the lowest-grossing weekend of Summer 2016 so far.

The new “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows,” debuted at No. 1 with an estimated $35.3 million, but that’s just over half of the $65.6 million debut that the previous “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles” enjoyed two summers ago. Romance “Me Before You” did half as well as “Out of the Shadows,” opening in third place with an estimated $18.3 million — besting Warner Bros.’ expectations. And Andy Samberg‘s boy-band mockumentary, “Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping,” underperformed with an estimated $4.6 million — landing in eighth place. Woof.

Meanwhile, the modest sales of “Out of the Shadows” were enough to displace last week’s winner, “X-Men: Apocalypse,” which fell 66 percent in its second weekend to No. 2 with an estimated $22.3 million. Last week’s big box office disappointment, “Alice Through the Looking Glass,” also fell more than 60 percent, landing in fourth place with an estimated $10.7 million.

C’mon, Hollywood, this is supposed to be the most lucrative season of the year, full of record-setting debuts of superhero sagas and family-friendly cartoons. What happened? What lessons can studio programmers learn from this weekend’s lackluster box office? Well, here are seven of them.

1. Sequel-itis
Remember, “TMNT” started out in the 1980s as a comic book parodying the “X-Men” franchise. It must be galling both to the publishers at Marvel and to the executives at Fox that their teenage mutants are playing second fiddle this weekend to the jokey, pizza-chomping, sewer-dwelling versions of their carefully cultivated intellectual property. Give credit, at least, to Paramount for recognizing that “X-Men: Apocalypse” was puny enough to be dethroned after just one week by a more kid-friendly team of comic-book heroes.

2. In the Summer, Reviews Don’t Matter…
Audiences know what they want from their summer escapism, critics be damned. “Popstar” had the best reviews among the new films, with a 78 percent “Fresh” on Rotten Tomatoes. “TMNT” had the weakest, just 37 percent. But the young male audience that “Popstar” targeted doesn’t care about reviews, and neither do the kids that “TMNT” sought. People were already predisposed to see (or avoid) both movies, and reviews weren’t going to sway them.

Same with “Me Before You,” which had middling reviews (55 percent fresh) from critics who complained about the movie’s heartstring-yanking manipulativeness. Of course, that’s precisely the romantic movie’s biggest selling point. Feature, not bug.

3. …And Neither Does Star Power
Of course, the. stars of “TMNT” are all computer-generated, but the filmmakers have chosen to surround them with actors familiar from roles in grown-ups-only movies, like Arrow” star Stephen Amell joins the franchise as fan favorite Casey Jones, as if there’s much overlap between his dark, adult comic-book series on the CW and the “TMNT” kids.

Meanwhile, Game of Thrones” wants to see her playing an adorable Manic Pixie Dream Girl in a contemporary romance.

Andy Samberg, at least, is working within his usual wheelhouse as the star of musical spoof “Popstar,” and he and the other Lonely Island guys have been promoting the heck out of it on TV appearances and on social media. Nonetheless, the former “Saturday Night Live” mainstay and “Brooklyn Nine-Nine” star has never proved that his TV following will follow him to the big screen.

4. There’s an Audience Starved for Romance
“Me Before You” was expected to bring in only about $12 to $14 million, so its estimated $18.3 million take is a pleasant surprise. Chalk it up to smart counter-programming against the family-oriented and male-oriented movies otherwise dominating the multiplex.

Indie romances “Love & Friendship” and “The Lobster” also added hundreds of theaters each this weekend and are reaping the benefits, with “Love” earning an additional estimated $2.2 million and “Lobster” clawing another estimated $1.6 million. As “Apocalypse” plummets,” “Neighbors 2: Sorority Rising” runs out of gas, and “Popstar” fails to get off the ground, it might be time for the studios to stop saturating the market with movies made for young men and start thinking about young women.

5. Might Be Time for More Originality at the Multiplex
In this weekend’s top 10, “Popstar” and “The Nice Guys” are the only two films not based on a pre-existing property. How’s that working out for them? It’s not so much that audiences only want to see sequels and reboots; rather, it’s that sequels and reboots seem to have crowded everything else out of the marketplace, at least throughout the summer. It seems that the ho-hum response to “TMNT 2” might be evidence of “sequel fatigue” among moviegoers, which could spell trouble for Hollywood this summer as sequels are what studios use to line their coffers during the season.

While the aforementioned originals have proven to be misfires, audiences will still flock to original ideas — as long as they are executed in ways that make it worth our hard-earned box office dollars.

6. There’s Only So Many Family Movie Dollars Out There
This might seem counterintuitive, especially now that school’s out. But “TMNT” might have done better if it weren’t competing against “Alice Through the Looking Glass,” “The Angry Birds Movie,” “The Jungle Book,” and even “Zootopia” (still in 400 theaters after 14 weeks).

7. The Math on Sequels Doesn’t Always Add Up
The last “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles,” which relaunched the franchise in 2014, cost about $125 million to make and earned nearly $500 million worldwide. Given that, for blockbusters like these, marketing costs about as much as production, and that the studio keeps only about half of the worldwide ticket receipts, the 2014 “TMNT” just about broke even.

Nonetheless, that was apparently good enough to justify a sequel, so now we have the $135 million “Out of the Shadows,” which will have to gross $540 million worldwide to break even. So far, it has taken in an estimated $69.3 million around the globe. Not a good sign.

Who knows, maybe Turtle fans are willing to shell out another $470 million for this one, but because family dollars are finite, the new Turtle tale is likely to sink in a couple weeks when “Finding Dory” swims into the multiplex. There may have been a sweet victory in beating “X-Men: Apocalypse” in early June, but at least if “Out of the Shadows” had come out in August, like its predecessor, it could have had the multiplex all to itself for a whole month.

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June 5, 2016
Why Did ‘Alice Through the Looking Glass’ Tank at the Box Office?

It was supposed to be a competitive race this weekend, with two blockbuster sequels grabbing large hauls of Memorial Day weekend dollars. But it wasn’t even close. As the holiday revelry ends, “X-Men: Apocalypse” stands as a modest superhero hit, while “Alice Through the Looking Glass” has fallen down the rabbit hole.

“X-Men” always had the edge, as it was opening on 400 more screens than “Alice.” As it turned out, it debuted near the low end of expectations, with an estimated $65.0 million through Sunday and a likely $80 million for the four-day weekend. That’s not up to the franchise’s usual standards, but it’s not terrible.

And it’s far better than “Alice,” which mustered only an estimated $28.1 million through Sunday, with a projected four-day weekend of $35.6 million. For a movie that cost a reported $170 million to make, that’s a catastrophe.

What happened? Was “Alice” a foreseeable disaster? In some ways, although it did hit one iceberg that no one could have seen looming. Here are the four things that did “Alice” in.

1. Fox’s X-Men Franchise Owns Memorial Day Weekend
Ten years ago, “X-Men: The Last Stand” set a Memorial Day weekend debut record, grossing $103 million from Friday to Sunday. “X-Men: Days of Future Past” premiered with $91 million over the three-day holiday two years ago. The “Apocalypse” opening means that the Marvel mutants now have three of the ten best Memorial Day debuts ever.

If Disney was counting on “Alice” to be rescued by superhero fatigue (this is, after all, the fourth major superhero saga released in the past four months) or on its own still-strong “Captain America: Civil War” to siphon off Marvel fans, well, neither of those things happened. Not even weak reviews (48 percent fresh at Rotten Tomatoes, 52 at Metacritic) could hold back the X-Men — indeed, they got solid word-of-mouth, as indicated by an A- grade at CinemaScore.

2. James Bobin Is No Tim Burton
No slight intended toward the “Muppets Most Wanted” director, but he’s not the household name, box office draw, or artistic visionary that the director of the initial “Alice in Wonderland” is. No wonder Burton’s name popped up in some of Disney’s marketing materials for “Through the Looking Glass,” as if the director’s contribution to the 2010 smash had anything to do with the current film.

Still, many consumers got wise, recognized that Burton sat this one out, and decided to do the same.

3. Those 3D Surcharges
The first “Alice” came out shortly after “Avatar” primed us all to pony up extra for 3D glasses. Six years later, American audiences are a lot more skeptical about the spectacles, and we’ll cough up the surcharge for enhanced-format movies only if the imagery really warrants it. But Disney pushed 3D on potential “Looking Glass” ticketbuyers far beyond what the market would bear.

Of the 3,763 venues showing the movie, at least 3,100 were showing it in 3D. There are also 380 screens showing “Looking Glass” in IMAX, another 77 premium large format screens, and even 79 D-Box theaters that will jostle your seats in time with the events on the screen. If you didn’t want to pay extra for any of that — if you just wanted to see the movie in plain old 2D, on a normal-sized screen, on a seat that didn’t move — you had few options.

4. Those Angry Birds
Maybe Disney thought it would have the family-friendly field all to itself for a while, at least until its own Pixar release, “Finding Dory,” opens in another three weeks. But after the stronger-than-expected debut of “The Angry Birds Movie” last weekend, “Alice” had some tough family competition.

Sony’s cartoon fell 51 percent from last week’s heights and still came in third with an estimated $18.7 million from Friday to Sunday.

Oh, by the way, kids also aren’t tired of Disney’s other two talking-critter movies, “The Jungle Book” and “Zootopia,” both still in the Top 10. You’d think Disney would have spaced all these movies further out so as not to cannibalize itself. On the other hand, you’d also think Disney wouldn’t wait six years to make an “Alice” sequel, long enough for the kids enchanted by the first movie to be in high school.

5. Those Bad Reviews
Critics weren’t going to swallow from the “Drink Me” bottle again. They panned “Alice,” giving it a 29 percent “Fresh” on Rotten Tomatoes and a 34 average at Metacritic. Not that kids read reviews, but their parents do. Actually, “Looking Glass” earned decent word-of-mouth from audiences, earning the same A- grade as “Apocalypse.” But to generate word-of-mouth, you have to get them into the theater first.

6. Johnny Depp
Depp’s not the box office draw he was six years ago. A string of flops, not to mention mannered performances in uninspired franchise movies (“Dark Shadows,” “The Lone Ranger“) has turned audiences off. Not that Disney would have replaced him as the Mad Hatter, but the studio had to have expected that he wouldn’t add much to the film’s box office appeal.

What Disney couldn’t have known, however, was that, on the eve of the “Looking Glass” release, news would break that Amber Heard was filing to divorce Depp after just 15 months of marriage and was accusing him of being violent and abusive. Those are not the headlines you want when you’re trying to launch a family film. How many moms and dads saw those reports and suddenly felt squeamish about putting money in his pocket or watching him play a harmless madcap on screen?
Don’t feel too bad for Disney over “Alice’s” stumble. The movie opened to an estimated $65.0 million overseas, where Depp remains a big star, and where viewers still like 3D. And Disney also crossed into $4 billion for the year so far — with more than half the summer still to come.

Maybe foreign audiences can still save this movie, though they’ll have to cough up about $540 million more just for “Looking Glass” to break even. Hey, it could happen. But on this side of the looking glass, the “Alice” sequel sure looks like a box office dud.

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May 30, 2016
5 Reasons Why ‘Angry Birds’ Crushed the Competition at the Box Office

So much for the three-peat.

“Captain America: Civil War” could have come out on top for the third straight weekend. It could even have lost 45 percent of last weekend’s business (when it earned $72.6 million) and still outdistanced this weekend’s three new wide releases. Even after three weeks, you might still have expected the Marvel mega-movie to outdistance three seemingly-undistinguished newcomers: a period action comedy starring no-longer-a-box-office-draw Russell Crowe and never-really-a-box-office-draw Ryan Gosling; a Seth Rogen comedy sequel, and a cartoon based on an app that everyone thought was really cool six years ago.
Nonetheless, “The Angry Birds Movie” knocked down “Captain America,” along with “The Nice Guys” (pictured) and “Neighbors 2: Sorority Rising,” as easily as a short stack of pigs. The cartoon earned an estimated $39.0 million, about $1 million more than distributor Sony had predicted. “Civil War” had to settle for second, with an estimated $33.1 million (down 54 percent from a week ago), while “Neighbors 2” debuted in third with an estimated $21.8 million, and “The Nice Guys” premiered at No. 4 with an estimated $11.3 million.

“Angry Birds” now boasts the second-biggest debut ever for a video game-based movie, behind only 2001’s “Lara Croft: Tomb Raider” ($47.7 million). How did the feather-tufted projectiles take down the mighty Marvel Cinematic Universe and two newer rivals? Here’s what “Angry Birds” had going for it.1. The “Birds” Empire Is Bigger Than You Thought
Remember when the first “Angry Birds” game came out in 2009? You had to have the app on your phone in 2010. By 2011, maybe you’d moved on, but apparently, kids (and many grown-ups) all over the world still love game house Rovio’s furious Finnish feathered friends. After all, the movie has already earned an estimated $112.0 million overseas. And every time users played an “Angry Birds” game in recent months, they were either getting an actual or in-kind ad for the movie.

2. Marketing Blowout
The film reportedly cost between $73 and $80 million to make, but Rovio has spent more than $100 million marketing it. Plus, Sony and Rovio got at least another $300 million in promotional support from some 100 merchandising partners worldwide, including McDonald’s, Ziploc, Home Depot, Nestle, French car manufacturer Citroën, and Lego (which made six different “Angry Birds” construction sets available a few weeks ago).

That giant balloon of main character Red that you saw last Thanksgiving during the Macy’s parade? Not a coincidence. This is the biggest campaign Sony has ever mounted for an animated feature.
3. Fans Liked the Execution
It earned a B+ grade at CinemaScore, indicating decent (if not great) word-of-mouth from ticketbuyers. Critics were less kind, giving it a 42 percent fresh rating at Rotten Tomatoes, but that’s actually not so bad considering how poorly they rate most movies based on video games.

4. Adult appeal
Kids may not care, but grown-ups may have noticed that the voices come from performers they’ve liked in grown-up comic roles, including four “Saturday Night Live” stars (Simpsons” scribe Jon Vitti.

“Our movie operates on the sophistication of any sort of Judd Apatow comedy,” co-director Fergal Reilly recently told Entertainment Weekly. Then there’s the soundtrack, which, in addition to featuring contemporary stars like Blake Shelton and Charli XCX (who both have voice roles in the film), also features ’80s hits by Rick Astley, Scorpions, and Tone Loc that few viewers under 35 will appreciate.
5. Timing
Sony smartly moved the film up from its initial July 1 release date. As a result, “Angry Birds” is the first major animated movie in wide release since “Zootopia” back in March and will remain the only one until Pixar’s “Finding Dory” on June 17. So it has the family demographic locked up. Its competition wasn’t really competing for the same viewers, with “Neighbors 2” going after young adults and “Nice Guys” after older adults. “Captain America,” of course, went after all three groups, but apparently, it couldn’t withstand three new movies dividing up its audience.

Don’t cry for Cap, though. On Sunday, “Civil War” became the first 2016 release to earn more than $1 billion worldwide. And of course, it’s going to lead into future “Avengers” movies with “Infinity War.”
Meanwhile, Rovio spent so much marketing “The Angry Birds Movie” that it had to lay off 40 percent of its staff last summer. And despite the film’s global take so far of $151 million, “Angry Birds” is going to have to gross about $360 million worldwide just to break even (since about half that take will go to the theater owners). It may reach that mark, and a sequel is probably inevitable, but if Rovio is really going to turn this weekend’s chart-topping debut into a viable franchise, it’s going to have to knock down an awfully tall pig pile.

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May 23, 2016
’Money Monster’: Are George Clooney and Julia Roberts Still Box Office Draws?

15 years ago, a movie starring George Clooney and Julia Roberts would have been automatic box office gold — a guaranteed $35 million opening weekend. This weekend, however, the pair’s “Money Monster” opened in third place, with an estimated $15.0 million, and even that was better than analysts predicted.

Because it came behind “Captain America: Civil War” (which held the top spot for the second week in a row) and Disney’s “The Jungle Book,” “Money Monster” will probably engender a lot of hand-wringing about how original movies and old-fashioned star power no longer attract audiences like they once did. Even though the film earned a modest $3 million more than expected.
There was similar discussion this time last year, when Clooney’s “Tormorrowland” flopped, followed by the failure of Cameron Crowe‘s “Aloha,” despite the presence of Bradley Cooper and Emma Stone. Many observers saw those failures as a death knell for both original screenplays and star power at the box office. What was overlooked was that neither of those movies turned out to be very good. Plus, they were followed almost immediately by original-screenplay hits that were either a testament to the stars who brought them to life (Dwayne Johnson in “San Andreas,” Melissa McCarthy in “Spy“) or to stellar execution (“Inside Out.”)

But the truth is, the right star in the right role– in the right movie — can still sell tickets. Clooney’s earlier 2016 movie, “Hail, Caesar!“, featured him as a pampered-doofus 1950s Hollywood star, a role with limited appeal to most Clooney fans, which is why the movie topped out at $30.1 million. On the other hand, it’s not that long since Clooney appeared in “Gravity,” an enormous ($274 million) hit based on an original idea (and also a triumph of digital filmmaking and 3D spectacle). Of course, the star whose appeal really sold that movie was Sandra Bullock, but Clooney helped.

Other recent Clooney pictures, such as “The Monuments Men” and “The Descendants,” aren’t generally thought of as huge hits, but they did both gross about $80 million. “Tomorrowland,” considered an even bigger flop because of its failure to recoup its massive budget, still earned $93 million in North America. None of these movies would have approached $100 million with a lesser star. “Money Monster” will definitely struggle to reach that height, but at least it will help that Clooney plays a familiar part in it, that of a smug professional who’s brought low, then struggles toward redemption.
Roberts, too, is considered a waning star, but she has two films right now in the top five. “Mother’s Day” opened modestly but held on well enough to add 150 more screens in its third weekend and managed a fifth-place take of $3.3 million. If anything, “Money Monster,” which opened with nearly twice the sales that “Mother’s Day” did, should do even better over the long run.

In any case, summer is generally a bad time to test star-drawing power at the box office, since it’s the time when concept, brand, and spectacle define movies more than stars do.

This weekend, however, we’ll see whether Russell Crowe and Ryan Gosling have enough combined star power to sell “The Nice Guys,” a period buddy-sleuth action-comedy whose original concept is hard to summarize on a poster.

Next month, Andy Samberg stars in the pop-documentary spoof “Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping” and Dwayne Johnson and Kevin Hart headline the action-comedy “Central Intelligence.” In July, we’ll see Matt Damon return to his tailor-made starring role in “Jason Bourne.” That’s a familiar franchise, but it wouldn’t do as well without Damon (as “The Bourne Legacy” demonstrated).

Should these prove a hit with audiences, it’s further proof that all you need is the right star, in the right role, in the right movie.

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May 15, 2016
3 Ways ‘Captain America: Civil War’ Conquered the Box Office

Ho-hum, another first weekend of the summer movie season, another blowout by a Marvel Cinematic Universe movie featuring an all-star cast of superheroes.

“Captain America: Civil War” premiered with an estimated $181.8 million, boasting the fifth-largest North American opening weekend ever, the third-largest May opening ever, and the third-largest MCU debut.

If such debuts are becoming routine, you can credit the filmmakers for their execution, Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige for the grand MCU blueprint, and the well-oiled Disney machine for its marketing and distribution efforts. Indeed, they all have these mega-launches down to a science, thanks to the lessons they’ve learned from past releases. Among those lessons, according to Disney Executive Vice President of Distribution Dave Hollis:

1. Quality ControlOr, as Hollis put it on Sunday, “You’ve gotta make a really great movie.” The MCU movies have been fairly consistent in quality, a status Hollis credits largely to Feige, though Feige’s willingness to hire inventive filmmakers (such as Joss Whedon for the “Avengers” movies or the Russo brothers for the two most recent “Captain America” films) ought to be acknowledged as well. The important elements, Hollis said, are “a great story, fantastic characters, and extraordinary worlds, all of which must be satisfying to fans and critics.” “Civil War” certainly seems to qualify, given the movie’s A grade at CinemaScore (indicating very strong fan word-of-mouth) and its appeal among reviewers, as shown by a 91 percent fresh score at Rotten Tomatoes and a 75 percent score at Metacritic.

2. New CharactersCertainly, Marvel fans come to these films to see familiar faces, but they’re also excited about new ones. Said Hollis, “Yes, you have to have movies that feature familiar characters, but you also have to keep this universe fresh by introducing new characters.” He was particularly pleased with the eagerly-anticipated introduction in “Civil War” of Black Panther (played by Chadwick Boseman), who’ll now have a much bigger fan base by the time he gets his own stand-alone movie in 2018. (Hollis did not cite the introduction in “Civil War” of Tom Holland as Spider-Man, perhaps because the forthcoming Spidey franchise reboot starring Holland will be made at Sony, outside of Disney and the MCU.) He also plugged Benedict Cumberbatch‘s Doctor Strange, who gets his own movie this November and will presumably loom large in future MCU movies after that.

A corollary, which Hollis didn’t mention, is that “Civil War” may offer one of the last opportunities to see Robert Downey Jr. play Iron Man. Though we can still expect to see Tony Stark suit up in the upcoming Avengers “Infinity War” saga, Downey has said he doesn’t expect to headline another stand-alone “Iron Man” chapter. Indeed, he told USA Today, the new “Captain America” is, as far as the actor is concerned, also his own “Iron Man 4.” To the extent that fans know Downey is nearly done playing Tony Stark, that could also have driven up sales for “Civil War.”

3. New GenresHollis said he was aware that critics — and many fans — may be getting tired of a multiplex blockbuster environment defined almost entirely by spandex-clad comic-book heroes and villains. “We’re inoculated against superhero fatigue,” he said, “by making movies that individually have a genre that’s outside the superhero movie.” For instance, he noted, the last “Captain America” installment (“The Winter Solder”) was more of “an espionage film.” “Guardians of the Galaxy” was more of “a space opera” than other Marvel movies have been. “And ‘Ant-Man‘ was a heist film.” He did not specify a genre for “Civil War,” though after DC’s “Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice” and “Civil War,” it seems like super-domestic-squabble drama is becoming a genre of its own.

One thing that did make the “Civil War” launch different from previous Marvel debuts is that the film hit the multiplex at a time when Disney already had an appeals-to-all-demographics smash still playing on more than 4,000 screens. In fact, “The Jungle Book,” now in its fourth week, took second place on the weekend chart and earned another estimated $21.9 million — roughly equal to the difference between the most optimistic analysts’ projections for where “Civil War” might open (that is, around $200 million) and how much it actually earned. At the very least, with “Jungle Book” in 4,144 venues and “Captain America” in 4,226, competition must have been fierce for the relative handful of available 3D, IMAX, and premium large format screens, whose ticket surcharges can account for a sizable percentage of a movie’s weekly take.

Hollis insisted that the two Disney all-ages hits didn’t cannibalize each other. “It’s hard to be anything but ecstatic” about a movie that opens with $181.8 million, he said, noting that MCU movies now occupy four of the top six slots among the biggest domestic opening weekends in Hollywood history. “There’s always going to be competition in the marketplace. It’s good for the overall ecosystem of the movie business. Both films will coexist for the next few weekends.”

In other words, the more the merrier, and success breeds success. In fact, Hollis said, the box office numbers alone for “Civil War” should inspire both potential moviegoers and repeat viewers over the next few weeks as much as the movie’s actual content and word-of-mouth. “The exciting thing is thinking about what is left to go,” he said. “$181 million worth of U.S. box office evangelism is about to hit the streets.”

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May 8, 2016
5 Reasons Why ‘Jungle Book’ Roared to the Top of the Box Office

It wasn’t a big surprise that Disney’s new live-action “The Jungle Book” opened at No. 1 this weekend. What was a shocker, however, was just how big the latest version of Rudyard Kipling’s tale turned out to be.

Going into the weekend, positive buzz for the film led to predictions that it would open to at least $70 million, $85 million on the high-end of expectations. On Sunday, however, Disney estimated that the film’s opening weekend had grossed $103.6 million. That makes it the second-biggest April opening ever, beating the $95.0 million earned by “Captain America: The Winter Soldier” two years ago, and second only to last year’s “Furious 7,” at $147.2 million. It’s also the biggest April opening ever for a PG-rated movie.

How did “Jungle Book” over-perform so much this weekend? Here are five ways.

1. Marketing
By now, Disney has mastered the art of turning its beloved animated classics into live-action reboots. But there’s more than brand recognition at work here. Disney’s marketers — and director Jon Favreau — made a point of playing up the state-of-the-art CG that allowed the filmmakers to simulate a jungle in a Los Angeles warehouse and populate it with photorealistic animals. The trailers audiences saw, and the advance stories they read, promised not just a kiddie adventure with talking animals, but also an immersive experience in a lush, exotic world on the level of “Avatar.”

2. 3D and IMAX
As a result, this marked the rare film that viewers felt merited the surcharges they’d have to pay to see it in an enhanced format. It helped that 75 percent of North American theaters showing “Jungle Book” screened it in 3D. A healthy 43 percent of the movie’s opening-weekend sales came from 3D tickets. It was also playing on 376 IMAX screens, good for $10.4 million, amounting to 10 percent of the total gross, and scoring another April record for a Disney feature.

And there were 463 Premium Large Format screens, for those willing to pay extra to see “Jungle Book” on a giant screen that’s not quite as eye-filling as IMAX. You could also see the film in D-Box, where your theater seat lurches in response to the on-screen action. Surcharges for those tickets can be as much as $8, meaning Disney was ensured to mint money on this film wherever people saw it.

3. Timing
Remember when the summer movie season began on Memorial Day? No? Remember when it began on May 1? Well, now, thanks to hits like “Winter Soldier,” “Furious 7,” and now, “Jungle Book,” summer seemingly begins just after spring break. Or it will within a couple of years. For now, however, April is still clear enough of blockbusters that a movie like “Jungle Book” can pretty much have the month to itself.

4. Weak Competition
This weekend’s crop of new releases posed no real threat to “Jungle Book’s” box office reign. Neither of this weekend’s other two new wide releases opened on more than 2,700 screens, compared to 4,028 for “Jungle Book.” “Barbershop: The Next Cut,” a sequel in a comedy franchise whose last installment came out 12 years ago, debuted in second place with an estimated $20.2 million. That’s below expectations and also shy of the $24.2 million opening weekend for 2004’s “Barbershop 2: Back in Business.” (“Cut” came in with less than the opening weekend of the original film.)

As for Kevin Costner‘s new thriller, “Criminal,” no one expected it to do more than about $8 million, but it fell short with $5.9 million. It didn’t even make the top five. Opening in sixth place, it is Costner’s lowest premiere weekend since since 2005’s “Rumor Has It.”

5. Four-quadrant Audience Appeal
One potential weakness in “Jungle Book” — had Disney stayed close to the 1967 cartoon — is that it’s an awfully male-oriented story, with no female characters of any significance, or even speaking parts. Favreau and his team changed that by making one male character (the python Kaa) female and boosting the role of another (Mowgli’s wolf mother, Raksha.) Scarlett Johansson voices Kaa (above), and Oscar-winner Lupita Nyong’o voices Raksha. Making the movie more inclusive seems to have paid off at the box office, since Disney exit polling showed that 51 percent of the viewers were female.

Favreau and his team also made sure the movie appealed to more than just kids. Celebrity voices (including Bill Murray and Chistopher Walken), an air of real danger in Mowgli’s confrontations with predators, and nostalgic shout-outs to the original cartoon (including such songs as “Bare Necessities” and “I Wan’na Be Like You”) all helped to draw grown-up viewers. According to Disney, some 43 percent of ticketbuyers were adults seeing the movie on their own.

Of course, what ultimately sold the movie was its execution. Critics raved, giving “Jungle Book” a 95 percent fresh rating at Rotten Tomatoes. Audiences loved it just as much, judging by the A CinemaScore, indicating very positive word-of-mouth. So: a good movie will draw audiences of all ages and both sexes off their couches and into the theaters — and even inspire them to pay extra for an enhanced viewing experience. Who knew?

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April 17, 2016
Box Office: 5 Reasons Why Melissa McCarthy Defeated the Dark Knight

Forget Wonder Woman or “Zootopia‘s” Officer Judy Hopps. The most commanding female at the box office this weekend was Melissa McCarthy’s hard-charging tycoon Michelle Darnell.

The battle this weekend was “Batman v Superman” vs. “The Boss,” and while the superhero saga was widely expected to threepeat at No.1 on the box office chart, it ended up being a neck-and-neck race. On Sunday, it looked like “The Boss” would be the victor, claiming an estimated $23.5 million and edging out “BvS” by just $45,000.

For “Boss” to come out ahead of “BvS” and two new competitors (“Demolition” and “Hardcore Henry“) is no small feat, especially considering how many obstacles it had to overcome. “The Boss” became the fifth McCarthy starring vehicle in a row to open above $21.5 million — despite really bad reviews and a C+ CinemaScore. This weekend’s results seem to show that, no matter what hurdles McCarthy has to leap, she’s an indomitable, dependable, bankable box office hitmaker. Here are five challenges she had to face before “The Boss” earned its title:

1. Timing
Most of McCarthy’s hits, including “The Heat” and “Spy,” have been summer releases. Could a big, broad comedy like this one open well in April? Well, why not? Her “Identity Thief” debuted strongly during the wasteland of February. Seems like audiences are happy to see McCarthy at any time of year.

2. The R Rating
Because it keeps kids and young teens away, the R rating is considered much more commercially risky than the more common PG-13, which Hollywood believes hits the sweet spot between edgy enough for adults and too edgy for kids. Yet McCarthy’s hits, going back to her initial breakout with “Bridesmaids,” have all been R-rated. As with her earlier films, the R rating on “Boss” lets viewers know that McCarthy has been allowed to go hog wild, without having to restrain her bull-in-a-china-shop comedy style in order to placate the ratings board.

3. The Demographic
There’s already a comedy out there that appeals to older women. In fact, “Boss” studio Universal released it just two weeks ago — “My Big Fat Greek Wedding 2.” Fortunately, there seems to be room for both movies in the marketplace. “Wedding 2” came in fourth this weekend with an estimated $6.4 million, good for a three-week total of $46.8 million. Of course, Nia Vardalos isn’t the star that McCarthy is, and her PG-13 movie won’t offend your grandma, while “Boss” certainly might. So the audience overlap is only so big.

4. The XX Factor
By now, it should be time for Hollywood to bury the perception that female-driven movies are risky bets.

McCarthy’s fearlessness makes her appealing to both men and women, but women drove the success of this film, making up 67 percent of its customers. Oh, and look at the top four movies on this weekend chart. Besides “Boss,” there’s “Batman v Superman” (whose strongest draw may actually have been the long-awaited introduction of Gal Gadot’s Wonder Woman), “Zootopia” (headlined by Ginnifer Goodwin‘s relentless rookie rabbit cop heroine), and Vardalos’ “Wedding 2.” Hey, Hollywood, still think women can’t sell tickets?

5. The Competition
New entries this weekend proved to be non-starts. With its first-person-shooter-POV gimmick and its clever online marketing campaign aimed at gamers, “Hardcore Henry” had been expected to open between $8 and $12 million, but mixed reviews and weak word-of-mouth (it also earned a C+ at CinemaScore) led to a fifth place debut with just an estimated $5.1 million.

Similarly, Jake Gyllenhaal‘s “Demolition” had been tracking toward a $3 million debut, but it also garnered mixed reviews. As a result, it didn’t even crack the top 10, opening instead at No. 15 with just an estimated $1.1 million.

And then there’s “Batman v Superman.” Despite its steep second-weekend drop last week, “BvS” has earned $296.7 million in just three weekends, or $700,000 more than Disney breakout hit “Zootopia” has earned in six. Its estimated $23.4 million gross in its third week is still better than most movies do in their first.

So should “The Boss” hold its slight lead over “BvS” when Monday’s final tally comes out, McCarthy will win more than just bragging rights for the week, or for having dethroned Batman and Superman.

She will show that, all by herself, at any time of year, even in a poorly-reviewed movie, McCarthy still can rule the box office like a boss.

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April 10, 2016
How ‘Batman v Superman’ Beat the Haters and Became a Box Office Juggernaut

Have you seen some of the scathing reviews that “Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice” has received? Forget Lex Luthor and Doomsday; this week it seemed like the biggest threats to the DC superheroes were the critics, who hurled pans that could have thwarted not just Bruce Wayne and Clark Kent but Warner Bros.’ vast DC Extended Universe franchise plans for the next decade.

Didn’t happen, of course. The fanboys — and everyone else — went anyway, helping “BvS” launch the franchise with an estimated $170.1 million, exceeding predictions by about $20 million and smashing numerous records in the process. It’s the biggest March opening ever, the biggest opening for a Batman or Superman movie, and the biggest opening ever for Warner Bros. With its dismal 29 percent score at Rotten Tomatoes, it’s also the worst-reviewed movie ever to earn more than $150 million during its first weekend.

So the universe is safe, and so is Warners’ investment in the future, starting with the $250 million invested in just this film’s production. Still, how did the studio manage to overcome the Kryptonite-like reviews, not to mention decades’ worth of justifiable fanboy apprehension over Warners’ often botched efforts to create its own Marvel-like big-screen mega-franchise? Here are six secret weapons “BvS” had up its spandex sleeves.

1. Wonder WomanShe may not have a huge part in the film, but DC fans have been waiting 75 years to see her on the big screen. According to a survey by ticket pre-seller Fandango, Gal Gadot‘s Amazon warrior princess was the single biggest draw, cited by 88 percent of respondents. Of course, Gadot has her own fanbase from the “Fast & Furious” franchise, and everyone knows she’s getting her own “Wonder Woman” movie next year. So many viewers were willing to sit through 2 1/2 hours of “BvS” just for a few glimpses of Wonder Woman holding her own with the top-billed heroes.

2. Everyone Else Who Isn’t Batman or SupermanAccording to the same survey, 60 percent of those polled were fans of Jesse Eisenberg who were eager to see the “Social Network” star’s take on villainous mogul Lex Luthor. And 66 percent were fans of director Zack Snyder, whose previous DC comic book films include “Watchmen” and “Man of Steel.” Not that people didn’t also want to see Ben Affleck‘s version of Batman or see “Man of Steel” star Henry Cavill don the red Super-cape again. Still, there were lots of other draws, including even the auteur behind the camera. Speaking of whom…

3. 3D and IMAXLove him or hate him (and there are many in both camps), Snyder deserves credit as a creator of eye-popping visuals that really do look like frames from a comic book brought to life. His movies are among the few that do benefit from being seen in enhanced format. It’s no wonder that a full 40 percent of this weekend’s “BvS” grosses came from 3D screenings, and a healthy 10.6 percent came from IMAX showings. Those ticket surcharges helped the supercharged opening.

4. TimingIt’s late March, so there’s really nothing out there, not even “Deadpool” or “Zootopia,” that offered a real obstacle to the “BvS” steamroller. The only other wide-release movie this week was the romantic comedy “My Big Fat Greek Wedding 2,” which actually did better than expected with it estimated $18.1 million premiere. Of course, it’s audience was 76 percent female, while “BvS” viewers were mostly guys (62 percent). So it’s not like Warner Bros. had to worry about Universal’s rom-com stealing much of its action audience.

5. The DC UniverseAs Marvel fans know, it’s sometimes hard to follow all the action in the Marvel Cinematic Universe movies if you haven’t been paying attention since the beginning. DC fans know that, if they want to keep up with the DC movies that will spring from this one — there are at least 10 of them on the drawing board set for release over the next five years, including this summer’s “Suicide Squad,” next year’s “Wonder Woman” and “Justice League,” and several others — they had to get in on the ground floor with “BvS.” Indeed the new movie contains not just a Wonder Woman guest spot but teasers and Easter eggs for heroes, villains, and plot developments that may not come to fruition for several years.

6. FOMOBut even if you’re not interested in coming up with your own fan theories or spotting references that may not pay off until, say, the release of the “Cyborg” movie in 2020, you still wanted to see “Batman v Superman” just out of Fear of Missing Out. Thanks to months (years?) of hype, it’s become part of the national conversation. (International, even, since the film has grossed an estimated $254 million abroad.) The terrible reviews have only added to that conversation. It can’t really be as bad as they say, can it? You went out of curiosity, or because you assumed the critics were just being pointy-headed elitists, or because, even if you thought they might be right, you still had to share the experience. (In fact, the film earned a blah B at CinemaScore, suggesting that word-of-mouth among viewers isn’t much more enthusiastic than the reviews.) It’s a conversation that’s not going to die down any time soon, especially because of the film’s controversial ending that’s sure to divide even die-hard DC Comics readers who might have seen it coming.

Or maybe you’ve just wondered since you were a kid who would win if your two favorite DC heroes fought each other. If so, then the premise of “Batman v Superman” is nearly impossible to resist.

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March 27, 2016