Over the long holiday weekend, Marvel’s X-Men showed their mutant strength while audiences shouted that they don’t want to watch Adam Sandler on vacation anymore.
Note: For this Memorial Weekend box office report, I’m primarily reporting the three-day numbers. However, the four-day numbers can also be found at the bottom of the post.
While ‘X-Men: Days of Future Past‘ easily locked in the top spot and demonstrated a resurgence for the once-failing franchise, much like ‘Godzilla’ and ‘The Amazing Spider-Man 2’, it just couldn’t top ‘Captain America: The Winter Soldier’ for the best three-day debut of 2014. From nearly 4,000 locations, the 3D superhero flick earned an impressive $91.4 million, which is up quite a bit from the last couple installments. In 2011, ‘First Class‘ only opened to $55.1 million. Last year’s ‘The Wolverine‘ did even less with $53.1 million. The third X-Men movie, ‘The Last Stand‘, still holds the franchise opening weekend record with $102.8 million, but I bet that will change with the next planned sequel, ‘X-Men: Apocalypse’.
Despite dropping a steep 66% in attendance, ‘Godzilla‘ managed to bring in another $31.1 million, bringing its ten-day total up to $148.4 million. It wasn’t hard for the behemoth to lock in the #2 spot, because Adam Sandler’s latest comedy failed to do anything special. From 3,500 locations, ‘Blended‘ only grossed $14.2 million. That’s even less than the star’s previous worst live-action debut. In 2011, ‘Jack and Jill‘ opened to $25 million. It’s about time that Sandler’s core audience smartened up.
‘Neighbors‘ slipped to fourth place with another $13.8 million in its third weekend. After 17 days, the R-rated comedy has earned $113.5 million.
‘The Amazing Spider-Man 2‘ took a hit from competing superheroes, but still rounded out the Top 5 with a $7.8 million fourth weekend. The reboot sequel has earned $184.9 million domestically and $489 million overseas.
On six screens, IFC’s ‘Cold in July‘ had a very mild limited opening. The suspense thriller debuted to $40,800, which averages out to just $6,800 per screen.
Top 10 (three-day weekend):
1. ‘X-Men: Days of Future Past’ (Fox) – $91,400,000
2. ‘Godzilla’ (Warner Bros.) – $31,125,000
3. ‘Blended’ (Warner Bros.) – $14,230,000
4. ‘Neighbors’ (Universal) – $13,897,000
5. ‘The Amazing Spider-Man 2’ (Sony) – $7,800,000
6. ‘Million Dollar Arm’ (Buena Vista) – $6,967,000
7. ‘The Other Woman’ (Fox) – $3,640,000
8. ‘Rio 2’ (Fox) – $2,450,000
9. ‘Chef’ (Open Road) – $2,266,000
10. ‘Heaven Is for Real’ (TriStar) – $2,050,000
Top 10 (four-day weekend):
1. ‘X-Men: Days of Future Past’ (Fox) – $111,000,000
2. ‘Godzilla’ (Warner Bros.) – $39,445,000
3. ‘Blended’ (Warner Bros.) – $18,185,000
4. ‘Neighbors’ (Universal) – $17,228,000
5. ‘The Amazing Spider-Man 2’ (Sony) – $10,000,000
6. ‘Million Dollar Arm’ (Buena Vista) – $9,709,000
7. ‘The Other Woman’ (Fox) – $4,525,000
8. ‘Rio 2’ (Fox) – $3,250,000
9. ‘Chef’ (Open Road) – $2,914,000
10. ‘Heaven Is for Real’ (TriStar) – $2,750,000
