Weekend Box Office: Super Bowl Slump

For the second consecutive week, the final ‘Kung Fu Panda’ entry topped the box office charts. One of the three new movies had a so-so weekend, while the other two bombed. As usual, blame is being placed on the Super Bowl, but that excuse only carries a bad movie so far.

Kung Fu Panda 3‘ may have finished in the top spot again with $21 million, but it fell 49% in attendance. Family flicks usually only fall in the 30% or low 40% ranges, so this comes as a bit of a hit. At this point in its run, ‘Kung Fu Panda 2‘ had also fallen 49%. However, that was after a $47.6 million summer opening weekend. ‘Panda 2’ also had $100 million in the bank at this point, while the ten-day total for ‘Panda 3′ is just $69 million.

It looks like the Coen brothers’ latest comedy just might be a little too inside baseball for mainstream moviegoers. Playing at 2,232 locations, ‘Hail, Caesar!‘ debuted in second place with $11.4 million. Despite being adored by critics, audiences simply didn’t turn out. This is the lowest opening for a Coen film playing on this many screens. Fortunately, the movie only cost $22 million to produce and should earn that back in domestic ticket sales.

After playing wide for over a month, ‘The Revenant‘ is still bringing in the dough thanks to word-of-mouth and Oscar buzz. It finished the weekend in the #3 spot and added another $7.1 million to its domestic total, which now sits at $149.7 million. The Leonardo DiCaprio picture has grossed $326.1 million worldwide.

After eight weeks, ‘Star Wars: The Force Awakens‘ is still crossing milestones. The film’s $6.8 million tally pushed its domestic total beyond the $900 million mark. Worldwide, it also crossed the $2 billion mark, making it only the third film to ever reach that feat.

Rounding out the Top 5 was the latest Nicholas Sparks romance picture, ‘The Choice‘, which very few people chose to see. The $6 million debut is the worst opening ever for a Sparks movie. No other Sparks movie has opened below $10 million, so this comes as a massive blow. Fortunately, it only cost $10 million to produce.

As poorly as ‘The Choice’ performed, at least it didn’t bomb as hard as ‘Pride and Prejudice and Zombies‘. From nearly 3,000 locations, the hybrid Jane Austen/zombie flick only grossed $5.2 million. That’s a terrible per-screen average of $1,774. Produced with a $28 million budget, the film’s impending international release will determine whether it becomes profitable or not.

Two of last weekend’s openers tanked in their second weeks. As if the tenth place debut of ‘Fifty Shades of Black‘ wasn’t bad enough, its sophomore weekend saw a 63% decline in attendance. The movie’s $2.1 million weekend gives it a ten-day total of $9.4 million.

Last week, the troubled Western Jane Got a Gun‘ opened on 1,200 screens but barely hit the #17 spot at the box office. This weekend, it fell a whopping 85% in attendance and landed in the #33 spot. The $127,000 total resulted in a minuscule per-screen average of $123.

Considering that Natalie Portman stars in ‘Jane Got a Gun’ and produced ‘Pride and Prejudice and Zombies’, this has been a difficult couple weeks for her career.

Top 10:

1. ‘Kung Fu Panda 3’ (Fox) – $21,000,000

2. ‘Hail, Caesar!’ (Universal) – $11,440,000

3. ‘The Revenant’ (Fox) – $7,100,000

4. ‘Star Wars: The Force Awakens’ (Buena Vista) – $6,890,000

5. ‘The Choice’ (Lionsgate) – $6,085,000

6. ‘Pride and Prejudice and Zombies’ (Screen Gems) – $5,200,000

7. ‘The Finest Hours’ (Buena Vista) – $4,715,000

8. ‘Ride Along 2’ (Universal) – $4,520,000

9. ‘The Boy’ (STX) – $4,098,000

10. ‘Dirty Grandpa’ (Lionsgate) – $4,050,000

1 comment

  1. Deaditelord

    I feel like the phrase “the final Kung Fu Panda entry” really should have final in Dr. Evil air quotes given Hollywood’s willingness to make sequels to bad family films. Cough… Alvin & the Chipmunks… cough.

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