Weekend Estimates: Split Retains Box Office Crown with Big Second Weekend
January 29, 2017
An impressive decline of 34% in its second weekend and a crop of middling to poor performances by new releases will be enough to keep Split safely at the top of the box office chart this weekend. With Universal projecting $26.3 million for the weekend as of Sunday morning, Split is well ahead of the studio’s new release, A Dog’s Purpose, which will come in with around $18.4 million. Split will finish the weekend with around $78 million in total.
A hold of 34% for a movie in its second weekend is very good indeed these days, and confirms the appeal of Split. Having a diverse audience helps too: the film split almost perfectly 50–50 female/male and 50–50 under- and over-25 on its opening weekend. For A Dog’s Purpose, the audience is skewing a little more female (56%), with a large family contingent. Its A CinemaScore should serve it well in weeks to come. The controversy around the treatment of animals during filming does seem to have knocked its box office down a little, but it pretty much hit expectations going into the weekend.
The same cannot be said of Resident Evil: The Final Chapter, which will take $13.85 million this weekend, according to Sony. That’s the worst opening for a film in the franchise by some margin, and it will need better-than-average legs to make it to $30 million in total. The franchise has always relied on international markets to make up for modest domestic business: the last two films made $235 million and $196 million internationally, and Sony will be looking to The Final Chapter to do the same. They would have been happier with another $20 million domestically though.
The final new wide release, Gold, is a flat-out bust for Weinstein, which predicts a $3.47 million debut from 2,166 theaters. The specialty distributor’s only real bright spot at the moment is Lion, which gains 35% this weekend on the back of its Oscar nominations, and has earned nearly $20 million domestically.
Other Oscar nominees getting healthy bounces this weekend include La La Land, which is up 43% after expanding into 3,136 theaters. It has now topped $100 million at the domestic box office, and should continue to enjoy good business in the run-up to the Oscars. Worth noting, however, is that its theater average is down this weekend to $3,842, which is the worst in the top five, so it might not stay in this many theaters for all that long. Hidden Figures, meanwhile, is down 11% this weekend to $14 million, but its theater average is holding up slightly better. It too passes $100 million this weekend. Regardless of which film is an Oscar favorite (and all the signs point towards La La Land at this point), it’s good to see two high-quality crowd pleasers top the chart.
Also in the Oscar frame, Arrival is up 357% this weekend to $1.47 million, thanks to adding back a bunch of theaters. Moonlight jumps 140% to $1.4 million. Manchester by the Sea gains 111% to earn $2 million this weekend, and has accumulated $41.5 million to date. Jackie is up 75% to $665,000; and Fences grows 16% to $1.41 million, and now has over $50 million in total.
With the love being spread so widely among awards contenders this weekend, no film that has reported numbers so far has topped a $10,000 theater average. The Salesman from Cohen Media Group is doing great business in three theaters, however, and should top $60,000 for the weekend.
- xXx: Return of Xander Cage comparison chart
-1-News.jpg)
- Split comparison chart
- Resident Evil: The Final Chapter comparison chart
- A Dog’s Purpose comparison chart
- Gold comparison chart
Filed under: Weekend Estimates, Resident Evil: The Final Chapter, Lion, Gold, Manchester by the Sea, Arrival, La La Land, Split, Hidden Figures, A Dog’s Purpose, Forushande, Fences, Jackie, Resident Evil