‘Rogue One’ forced its way to the #1 spot at the weekend box office for a second week. Great reviews and audience reaction are driving this flick — the first ‘Star Wars’ film not directly connected to the main Saga. Directed by Gareth Edwards and starring Felicity Jones, Diego Luna, Forest Whitaker, Donnie Yen, Wen Jiang, Ben Mendelsohn, Mads Mikkelsen, Jimmy Smits, the voice of Alan Tudyk and some kind of CGI witchery in the form of young Grand Moff Tarkin and Princess Leia, ‘Rogue One’ took in an additional $70 million in its sophomore weekend.
That once again puts ‘Rogue One’ well above even the closest competitor, Universal’s animated ‘Sing’, which generated $33.1M. Though not by animated rulers Disney and Dreamworks, ‘Sing’ features an all-star cast including Matthew McConaughey, Reese Witherspoon, Seth McFarlane, Scarlett Johansson, John C. Reilly, Taron Egerton, and Jennifer Hudson.
The poorly reviewed ‘Passengers’ came in at #3 with $12,8M. Video game adaptation ‘Assassin’s Creed’edged out comedy ‘Why Him?’ for fourth place.
- Rogue One (Disney) – $70M
- Sing (Universal) – $$33.1M
- Passengers (Sony) – $12.8M
- Assassin’s Creed (Fox) – $12.8M
- Why Him? (Fox) – $10.5M
There had been hopes that somebody would finally make a decent video game movie ‘Assassin’s Creed’ would kickstart a franchise with Michael Fassbender headlining, but… yeah that’s not happening.
‘Passengers’ was one of the most anticipated movies of the holiday season, with appealing stars Jennifer Lawrence and Chris Pratt. But perhaps Sony made a mistake screening the film for critics first, as the reviews are pretty universally terrible. (32% on Rotten Tomatoes.)
Just in time for awards season, next week sees the release of Ben Affleck’s gangster drama ‘Live By Night’ and the Taraji P. Henson-led ‘Hidden Figures’. Check back to see how they compare to the ‘Star Wars’ juggernaut or the other current champs.
Source: Deadline
