Box Office Weekend – ‘The Predator’ Bleeds With Soft Opening
Because of major storms hitting the East Coast, the domestic box office is taking a bit of a hit, but even then, new release The Predator isn’t doing too great outside of the areas affected. Meanwhile, the latest Mission: Impossible film reaches a series high on its eighth weekend of play.
The Predator opened to around $24M, which is just short of the opening its predecessor Predators (which was made for a thrifty $40M compared to its sequel’s $88M budget) made. The overseas box office isn’t exactly looking all that great either and probably won’t bail Fox out here, so they’d better hope for decent legs on their creature feature and hope that the movie has a decent life on Blu-Ray and DVD. Audiences didn’t exactly go crazy for the movie with a tepid C+ CinemaScore, and the last-minute controversy where it came out that the movie had a deleted scene where an actor who was a registered sex offender shared a scene with sexual harassment victim Olivia Munn didn’t do it any favors. Overall, The Predator had the lowest live-action opening for a movie to play in over 4,000 theaters, taking the dubious honor away from last year’s version of The Mummy.
Of the weekend’s other big releases, A Simple Favor is the only real winner here. The critically-praised Paul Feig thriller is off to a pretty good start with over $16M against a $20M budget. That’s ahead of initial expectations of a $12M to $15M opening and a sign that word-of-mouth is playing in the movie’s favor (pun not intended, honest), and in any case it shouldn’t have problems with having legs at the box office. White Boy Rick, a hopeful award-season contender, isn’t making a huge wave at the box office with a sub-$9M opening, and that could hurt its chances down the road for recognition at various ceremonies in the face of competition like First Man or A Star is Born. Lastly, Unbroken: Path to Redemption is another faith-based movie that isn’t a breakout hit with a $2M+ opening, but the budget is small enough at $6M that it will probably reach a point of profitability eventually.
Crazy Rich Asians is about a day away from topping $150M domestically, which is another big win for the romantic comedy as it continues to outpace comparable movies like The Help. Meanwhile, Mission: Impossible has finally unseated Mission: Impossible II as the highest-grossing movie in the series at the domestic box office. It has a real chance of clearing $800M globally by the end of its run, which would also improve its status as the the best outing for the franchise on an international level. Hotel Transylvania 3 managed to clear a significant milestones internationally with a $500M total, which is also a best for the franchise. The film may top the previous film at the domestic box office, although it looks like that’s going to be a close call at the current rate.
The Top Twelve box office performances for the three-day weekend can be summarized as follows (bolded titles are new releases):
- The Predator (20th Century Fox) – $24M Total.
- The Nun (Warner Bros./New Line) – $18.2M Weekend/$85.076M Total; 66.2% Drop.
- A Simple Favor (Lionsgate) – $16.05M Total.
- White Boy Rick (Sony Pictures/Studio 8) – $8.8M Total.
- Crazy Rich Asians (Warner Bros.) – $8.7M Weekend/$149.551M Total; 33.8% Drop.
- Peppermint (STX Entertainment) – $6.07M Weekend/$24.245M Total; 54.8% Drop.
- The Meg (Warner Bros.) – $3.805M Weekend/$137.087M Total; 37.6% Drop.
- Searching (Sony Pictures/Screen Gems) – $3.2M Weekend/$19.621M Total; 30% Drop.
- Mission: Impossible – Fallout (Paramount Pictures) – $2.315M Weekend/$216.135M Total; 40.4% Drop.
- Unbroken: Path to Redemption (Pure Flix) – $2.35M Total.
- Christopher Robin (Disney) – $2.028M Weekend/$95.021M Total; 40.4% Drop.
- BlacKkKlansman (Universal Pictures/Focus Features) – $1.295M Weekend/$45.944M Total; 50.4% Drop.
Mission: Impossible – Fallout, The Meg, Crazy Rich Asians, The Nun, and The Predator are now playing in theaters.
Grant Davis is a freelance writer who has covered entertainment news for more than seven years. His articles have frequently appeared in Star Wars News Net as well as as other entertainment-related websites. As someone who grew up on Star Wars and comic book movies, he’s completely thrilled with the current era of genre entertainment.
