Weekend Box Office

Surprising no one, ‘Star Wars: The Last Jedi’ ruled the weekend box office making even more than it was projected to, with $220 million, roughly $20M more than its predicted $200M.  It had the second highest opening weekend ever, trailing behind ‘Star Wars: The Force Awakens’, which made $247.966M during its opening frame.

Not only is ‘The Last Jedi’ raking in the cash, it is getting glowing reactions from viewers, who gave it a rare five out of five stars for PostTrak and an “A” CinemaScore, while critics are also reacting kindly, with a 96% Rotten Tomatoes score.  On Friday, ‘The Last Jedi’ generated an astounding 438K hashtags on social media, more than twice that of any movie within the last five years.

The gap between the #1 movie and #2 is astounding.  The runner-up was Fox’s animated ‘Ferdinand’ which took in $13.3M, over $200M less than what ‘Star Wars’ made.  Fox has been successful in the past by counter-programming against these huge epics with films aimed at younger children, as it did with ‘Alvin & the Chipmunks: The Roadchip’.  But now that Disney has purchased Fox, this will likely be the last instance of this sort of scheduling.  ‘Ferdinand’ features the voice of WWE star John Cena and as a result, over-performed in the heartland and under-performed on the coasts.

Here is the run-down:

  1. Star Wars: The Last Jedi (Disney) – $220M
  2. Ferdinand (20th Century Fox) – $13.3M
  3. Coco (Disney) – $10M
  4. Wonder (Lionsgate) – $5.4M
  5. Justice League (Warner Brothers) – $4.1M

While the major studios sat out the weeks leading up to the release of ‘The Force Awakens’, they are waking up from their hibernation on Christmas weekend.  For families, ‘Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle’ opens.  For younger females, there is ‘Pitch Perfect 3’.  And for those who love glitz, there is awards-bait musical ‘The Greatest Showman’.

It’s highly unlikely that any of them will dethrone ‘The Last Jedi’ but they could muscle their way into the Top Five.  Check back to see how things turn out!

Source: Deadline