It’s finally that time of year when there are more movies out than anyone has time to see! Not only did “Venom” and “A Star in Born” have impressive second weekend holds, but “First Man” and “Bad Times at the El Royale” both suffered less than stellar openings, while the independent film “Beautiful Boy” had the top per theater average not only for the weekend, but for any Amazon Studios theatrical release.
“Venom” remained at number one, grossing another $35 million. After grossing $80 million in its first weekend, many suspected it would suffer a more catastrophic drop, as word of mouth has been pretty mixed. However, its 54.6% drop-off suggests that audiences are still enjoying the Tom Hardy “Spider-Man” spin-off. Combined with its international gross, “Venom” has already made $377 million and shows little signs of slowing down.
Bradley Cooper and Lady Gaga’s “A Star is Born” had the lowest drop of the weekend. Photo courtesy of Vulture.com
Once again, “A Star is Born” took second place, making $28.4 million on its second weekend. The fourth big screen iteration of the classic story is definitely connecting with audiences, as its soundtrack is topping the Spotify charts and it’s already posed as one of this award season’s top frontrunners. Its 33.7% drop is the smallest drop of the weekend, showing that people are still clammering to the theaters to see not only Lady Gaga’s big screen debut (not counting “Machete Kills”) and Bradley Cooper’s first directorial effort.
Ryan Gosling stars as Neil Gosling in the biopic “First Man.” Photo courtesy of digitalspy.com
Damien Chazelle’s follow up “La La Land” didn’t make the same impact his musical about Hollywood did. “First Man” for which Chazelle reteamed with Ryan Gosling, is not only the long-awaited Neil Armstrong biopic, but its also the biggest budget Chazelle has had to work with and the first of his films to open wide. “First Man” didn’t have the spectacular opening that Universal was hoping for. Coming in third place and grossing only $16 million, it was seemingly overshadowed by the other, more commercial movies currently out. A common complaint from those who did see “First Man” was, in addition to saying it’s too slow and introspected, that it didn’t show Armstrong placing the American flag on the moon. This seems like a strangely specific thing to complain about, but multiple news outlets have reported about the “controversy” over the weekend.
“Goosebumps 2: Haunted Halloween” also opened in fourth place this weekend to $15.8 million, a far cry from the $23.6 chart topping debut of the first entry to the franchise based of R. L. Stine’s children book series. “Goosebumps 2” had a lot working against it; the star of its first film, Jack Black, only made a brief cameo, the films budget was roughly half of the first movie’s and Black starred in last month’s similarly themed “The House with a Clock in Its Walls,” which may have cannibalized some of their preteen Halloween audience.
The cast of “Bad Times at the El Royale” includes Chris Hemsworth. Photo courtesy of vox.com
The other new release of the weekend “Bad Times at the El Royale” debuted in a disappointing seventh place, making only $7.1 million. Drew Goddard’s follow up to 2012’s “The Cabin in the Woods” made less than half his first feature’s $14.7 opening. The Tarantino inspired ensemble drama, which featured performances by Chris Hemsworth, Jon Hamm and Dakota Johnson, didn’t seem to connect with audiences as the studio hoped it would. With such a packed weekend, it’s to be expected that some films will fall between the cracks of public consciousness, and its R rating and nearly 2 and a half hour runtime may have detracted some. However, this could be used by the studios as more evidence against mid-budget original films, as remakes and sequels seem to be a safer bet for box office success.
“Beautiful Boy” costars Steve Carell and Timothee Chalamet as the real life father and son David and Nic Sheff. Photo courtesy of goldderby.com
Regarding the specialty market, Amazon opened “Beautiful Boy” in 4 theaters and had the best per theater average of not only the weekend, but of any theatrical release by Amazon. For those who don’t know, a per theater average is a films weekend gross divided by the number of theaters it’s playing in. So “Beautiful Boy’s” $218,888 opening divided by its 4 theaters means that each theater brought in $54,722. In comparison, “Venom’s” $35 million weekend divided by its 4,250 theaters means each theater made roughly $8,235 from “Venom.” The per theater average is especially important when looking at smaller films that hope to be in the awards season, as they often open small, but show if audiences are rushing to the theaters to see them. In the case of “Beautiful Boy” it seems that they were. While the movie hasn’t been a slam-dunk, review wise, it is being praised for its performances by Steve Carell and Timothee Chalamet, who play a father and drug addicted son struggling for sobriety.
Jamie Lee Curtis returns to the franchise that made her a star with 2018’s “Halloween.” Photo courtesy of theverge.com
Next weekend sees the release of “Halloween” which will likely be a huge opening weekend as everyone’s craving a good scary movie as the 31st of October looms closer.
Did you go to the movies this weekend? If so, what did you see?
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