Weekend predictions: Book Club heading for third place as Guardians, Mario dominate

May 12, 2023

Book Club: The Next Chapter

It’s counter-programming week in movie theaters, with four new wide releases trying to lure audiences that aren’t into (or have already seen) The Super Mario Bros. Movie or Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 3, with the goal of earning some money before Fast X steamrollers the competition next weekend. Book Club: The Next Chapter is the film most likely to come out on top among the new releases, but a third-place finish is the best-case scenario for the romantic comedy.

Here’s what our model thought of Book Club 2 going into the weekend:

Although there are some obvious recent comps—in particular 80 for Brady, which opened with $12.7 million in February (and to a lesser extent Moving On, which debuted with $821,961 in March)—the model always uses previous installments in a franchise as its benchmark. That doesn’t make much difference in this case. Using the original Book Club as a point of comparison gives the $10.9-million prediction above. If 80 for Brady is the comp, the model comes up with a prediction of around $11 million.

Thursday’s preview numbers tell much the same story…

I should note that Box Office Pro got an amended estimate of $550,000 for The Next Chapter. We haven’t heard that from the studio, although I don’t doubt that it’s true. If one uses that as the benchmark, the prediction for the weekend veers up towards the $11-million mark.

However, some of those preview earnings come from screenings last Sunday. We don’t know how much, but taking a slightly lower estimate for Thursday preview earnings seems prudent. Note that 80 for Brady earned $520,000 from early screenings and $750,000 from Thursday screenings. If Book Club is following that pattern, it would have earned $325,000 from previews on Thursday. Plugging that into the model gives a weekend prediction of $7.9 million.

On the flip side, the film is clearly targeting Mothers Day on Sunday, and that should improve its final weekend numbers. I feel like it’s headed for something closer to $9 million than $10 million, but it still has a chance of breaking that psychologically-important barrier.

The other new release that could hit the top 10, according to our model, is the sci-fi action thriller Hypnotic.

Hypnotic has an all-star cast under the direction of Robert Rodriguez. Its weakness, at least from the model’s perspective, is that it’s being released by Ketchup Entertainment. The indie distributor has actually been around since 2012, but this is its first wide theatrical release. Generally, smaller distributors struggle with widely released films, but as the chart above shows, these films can earn respectable amounts on opening weekend (before rapidly heading to the home market).

Personally, I think a place in the top 10 with over $1 million would be respectable for this film, but the model is quite a bit more bullish.

Here’s what the model thinks the top 10 will look like.

Three other films have a shot at sneaking into the top 10: Rally Road Racers, Fool’s Paradise, and Knights of the Zodiac. The model thinks Knights of the Zodiac has the best chance, and it could hit $2 million. It’s hampered by lack of marketing and awareness, as are the other two films, so it’s not included in the final prediction for the weekend.

Perhaps the burning question of the weekend is how steeply Guardians of the Galaxy will drop in its second outing. The model thinks 58% would be a par score, given its opening. I think that would be a minor triumph given the 70% second-week decline we recently saw for Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania. Anything better than that would be a step forward for the MCU. I’d bet on it falling 65% to $41.4 million or so. Likewise, I think Mario will drop more than the model predicts, although that could benefit from Mothers Day, and it could bounce back a bit after being pummeled by Guardians last weekend.

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Filed under: Weekend Preview, Fast X, The Super Mario Bros. Movie, Hypnotic, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 3, Fool’s Paradise, Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania, 80 for Brady, Book Club: The Next Chapter, Moving On, Knights of the Zodiac, Rally Road Racers, Robert Rodriguez