Weekend Box Office: Lost at Sea

This Labor Day weekend certainly didn’t have many theater chain employees laboring much. The older movies held over quite well, but the two new wide releases struggled.

Horror movies – especially those of the R-rated variety – typically fall between 50-60% in their sophomore weeks, but ‘Don’t Breathe‘ turned a blind eye to the norm. Retaining the top spot at the box office, the wicked thriller pulled in $15.8 million over the three-day weekend, resulting in a light 40% week-over-week drop. Looking at the four-day numbers, it scored $19.5 million, which brings its domestic 11-day total up to $54.9 million. That’s not too shabby for a $10 million picture, right? With this horror flick having some legs, it’s easy to see why the weekend’s new scare picture, ‘Morgan’, could suffer so much – but we’ll talk about that in a minute.

Now in its fifth week, ‘Suicide Squad‘ is still going strong. Finishing in second place, it added $9.8 million over the three-day weekend and $12.8 million over the four days. Labor Day’s numbers pushed the $175 million comic book movie over the domestic $300 million threshold. Worldwide, it has now earned $675.7 million.

Kubo and the Two Strings‘ took the #3 spot over the three-day weekend, but flip-flopped with ‘Pete’s Dragon’ into the #4 spot if you include the Monday four-day numbers. ‘Kubo’ added $6.3 million over the three days and $8.5 million over the four days, giving it a domestic total of $36.3 million. Its international total now sits at $5.4 million, for a worldwide 17-day total of $41.7 million. Meanwhile, ‘Pete’s Dragon‘ grossed $6.2 million over the three days and $8.5 million over the four days, making a four-week domestic total of $66.3 million. Internationally, it has earned $28.6 million, placing its worldwide total at $94.9 million.

Four weeks into its run, ‘Sausage Party‘ managed to round out the Top 5 with another $5.2 million over the three-day weekend and $6.5 million over the four days. I expected the $19 million animated comedy to be a flop, but with an $89.6 million domestic total, it’s anything but. International showings have brought in $14 million, for a $103.6 million worldwide total.

The best that either of the weekend’s new wide releases could muster was an eighth place opening. With a combination of very light marketing and very heavy subject matter, this sort of debut was to be expected for ‘The Light Between Oceans‘. Derek Cianfrance’s $20 million drama made $4.6 million over the three-day weekend and $5.9 million over the four days. As a fan, I’m hoping that Oscar buzz and positive word-of-mouth can keep it afloat. The film’s international run has yet to kick off, so it still stands a chance.

With a very slowly expanding release, ‘Hell or High Water‘ finally crept into the Top 10. Climbing to #9, its three-day weekend resulted in $4.4 million and the four-day weekend in $5.6 million. To date, Lionsgate’s $12 million heist drama has earned $15.7 million domestically. If it felt like ages for ‘Hell or High Water’ to expand in North America, have some sympathy for our friends overseas. The movie still has yet to kick off its international release.

The saddest news of weekend comes from the 2,020-screen release of ‘Morgan‘. The horror-thriller finished the three days in the #17 spot with just $1.9 million. Over the four-day holiday, it grossed $2.4 million and was bumped into the #18 spot by the re-release of ‘Finding Dory’. Fortunately, Fox’s massive flop was only produced for $8 million.

Neither the three-day nor the four-day numbers for Rob Zombie’s ’31’ or Kevin Smith’s ‘Yoga Hosers’ have been announced.

3-Day Weekend Top 10:

1. ‘Don’t Breathe’ (Screen Gems) – $15,800,000

2. ‘Suicide Squad’ (Warner Bros.) – $9,825,000

3. ‘Kubo and the Two Strings’ (Focus) – $6,391,000

4. ‘Pete’s Dragon’ (Buena Vista) – $6,227,000

5. ‘Sausage Party’ (Sony) – $5,200,000

6. ‘Bad Moms’ (STX) – $4,760,000

7. ‘War Dogs’ (Warner Bros.) – $4,745,000

8. ‘The Light Between Oceans’ (Buena Vista) – $4,615,000

9. ‘Hell or High Water’ (Lionsgate) – $4,450,000

10. ‘Mechanic: Resurrection’ (Summit) – $4,374,000

4-Day Weekend Top 10:

1. ‘Don’t Breathe’ (Screen Gems) – $19,550,000

2. ‘Suicide Squad’ (Warner Bros.) – $12,800,000

3. ‘Pete’s Dragon’ (Buena Vista) – $8,583,000

4. ‘Kubo and the Two Strings’ (Focus) – $8,537,000

5. ‘Sausage Party’ (Sony) – $6,500,000

6. ‘War Dogs’ (Warner Bros.) – $6,025,000

7. ‘Bad Moms’ (STX) – $6,000,000

8. ‘The Light Between Oceans’ (Buena Vista) – $5,910,000

9. ‘Hell or High Water’ (Lionsgate) – $5,600,000

10. ‘Mechanic: Resurrection’ (Summit) – $5,550,000

8 comments

  1. Les

    I just don’t understand the rather pathetic release schedule for “Hell Or High Water”. Even today, I am seeing HOHW only playing in around 1,300 theaters nationwide.. Typical wide releases are in a range of 3,000 to 3,500 theaters. This was a movie that I was looking forward to seeing but so far the closest theater in my state that is showing HOHW is 3+ hrs. away. I would actually drive 90 miles to see HOHW, which is the next closest theater, but not 3 hrs.

    HOHW has had great critic reviews plus some talk of potential Oscar nominations so it is sad the distribution sucks so bad.

    At this point, I am pretty much thinking it is never going to play where I live or even close. With such a dismal release schedule this past weekend, maybe CBS Films should have went for a much larger US distribution over the Labor Today weekend and the movie could have scored even bigger at the box office.

    I will still go see it if it ever shows up otherwise I will just wait for the Digital HD, I guess. I probably would have checked out Morgan this past weekend also, but it was a no show too at the theater.

    • Bolo

      ‘Hell or High Water’ was a good movie. I hope you get a chance to see it. I am surprised it didn’t get a wider release. I think it has fairly broad appeal.

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