Weekend Wrap-Up

Captain America: Civil War a Money Monster

By John Hamann

May 15, 2016

'Lord Palmerston!' 'Pitt the Elder!'

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Is scheduling a film called Money Monster - in the shadow of what is sure to be the biggest opener of the summer – irony? Is it stupid, or sly, like a fox? After the debut of George Clooney’s latest, I’m leaning to the latter.

Following the massive $179.1 million open for Captain America: Civil War last weekend, the box office moves toward normality this weekend, as we have two openers – a thriller for adults in Money Monster with George Clooney and directed by Jodie Foster, and The Darkness, the latest in Jason Blum’s ‘$5 million or less’ horror campaign, this time bringing Kevin Bacon and Radha Mitchell out for support. No matter how you slice it though, this weekend is Disney’s, as Marvel’s Civil War, The Jungle Book and Zootopia all make the top ten, and all have grosses beyond $800 million worldwide, and finishes just a few million short of the same studio having three $300 million domestic earners in the top ten at the same time. This has never happened in the history of box office.

Our number one film for the second weekend in a row is Captain America: Civil War, the latest Disney/Marvel steamroller and third consecutive dominator released by the Mouse House within the last 11 weekends. After Civil War debuted with that powerful $179.1 million last weekend, all eyes were on the drop heading into the second frame. Civil War was looking to have a similar drop as Avengers: Age of Ultron, which opened to $191.3 million and then fell 59% to $77 million in its second frame. Iron Man 3 opened to $174.1 million on the same date in May 2013, and fell 58% to $72.525 million in weekend two. To stay in line with Ultron and Iron Man 3, Captain America 3 would need to earn about $73 million, and after a Friday gross of $19.44 million, a target multiplier of 3.75 was needed to keep the drop below 60%. Age of Ultron scored a 3.66 second weekend multiplier and Iron Man 3 a 3.68, so the pressure was on.



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On Saturday, Captain America: Civil War earned a very strong $32.1 million, up a monstrous 65% from Friday -just missing Age of Ultron’s second Saturday gross of $33.8 million. Over the weekend, Civil War pulled in $72.56 million in its second weekend, an extremely strong result. That gives the threequel the 8th biggest second weekend of all time, finishing beyond Spider-Man’s $71.4 million, Shrek 2’s $72.2 million, and even Iron Man 3’s $72.53 million second frame. The drop here is even better than expectations, as not even a touch of sequel-itis can take a bite out of this one, as the 59.5% drop matches Ultron’s 59.4% and comes very close to Iron Man 3’s 58.4% drop. Civil War will cross the $300 million domestic mark tomorrow, only its 11th day of release, as it has a domestic total to date of $295.9 million.

Civil War should have another strong domestic weekend in the next frame, before facing off against X-Men sequel and the Alice sequel two weekends from now. It should have no problem getting to $400 million. The global take this weekend for Captain America 3 came in at an ungodly $84 million in its third overseas weekend, as it hits a global tally of $940 million. It moved past Batman v Superman like it was standing still, as the Warner Bros. product has earned ‘only’ $868 million worldwide. It should finish behind only Marvel’s Avengers ($1.5 billion worldwide), Avengers: Age of Ultron ($1.4 billion) as the biggest worldwide Marvel products ever - and may catch Iron Man 3 ($1.2 billion). The Disney combination of Zootopia, The Jungle Book and Captain America: Civil War is going to earn an almost guaranteed $3 billion trifecta for the studio.

In a bit of a surprise, The Jungle Book holds very strongly this weekend, despite being in release for five weekends. This weekend, the other Disney power house earned another $17.8 million, and drops only 28% compared to last weekend’s $24.5 million haul. For biggest fifth frame of all time, It finishes a stunning 10th, between Jurassic World ($18.2 million) and Guardians of the Galaxy ($17.1 million) as it plays with some of the leggiest blockbusters of all time. The domestic gross has hit a wild $311.8 million, crossing the $300 million mark on Saturday, its 30th day of release, the same amount of time it took leggy classics like Inside Out and Minions. The Jungle Book is already pushing toward the $200 million mark in China alone, and now has an overseas gross of $516 million. That puts the global at $828 million, and with Japan and Hong Kong still to come (and likely adding another $100 million in sales) The Jungle Book is still on track to reach the billion dollar mark.


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