Box Office Discussion: "It" Coin

Killer clowns once again carried the weekend, though larcenous strippers provided a significant challenge.



Though not nearly as dominant as expected, It: Chapter Two won its second weekend with a $39.6 million haul, which brings the film's 10-day gross to $152.7 million.  To be fair, that's a huge amount of money.  It 2 will likely finish as either the highest or second-highest grossing R-rated horror film in history, and with a production budget of $70 million, should turn a nice profit.  Still, it's hard not to notice that something is off with Chapter 2.  Whether it's the weaker reviews than the first, the nearly 30-minutes-longer running time, or the fact that the first one, despite being only half the book, reached a satisfying conclusion, for whatever reason, people are not flocking to see the second part anywhere near the rate they went to see the first.  Chapter 2's second weekend, for example, was over $20 million off the second weekend of Chapter 1, and Chapter 2 overall is running roughly $66 million behind.  By the end of weekend 2, the first It had reached about 67% of its final total.  If that pattern holds, Chapter 2 could finish over $100 million below. 

The weekend's big box office news wasn't even the woes of It.  About a month ago, word started circulating that Hustlers might be a sleeper hit, despite a title, premise (strippers turned robbers) and star (Jennifer Lopez) that suggested it was nothing more than a B-grade throwaway.  The buzz kept growing, and when critics saw the film, they showered it with near-unanimous praise.  It opened this weekend to a huge $33.2 million, exceeding even the optimistic expectations.  Amazingly enough, it's only the third film of the year that's not a remake or part of a franchise to open over $30 million (the other two being Us and Once Upon a Time in Hollywood).  Hustlers is, by a wide margin, the biggest live-action opening of J.Lo's career, and will almost certainly be her biggest hit since at least Monster-in-Law in 2005.  Indeed, it could be her first live-action film ever to exceed $100 million domestic.  It's also, by a wide margin, the biggest opening in upstart distributor STX's history.  The film has also started attracting Oscar buzz, both for the film itself and for Lopez's performance, as she's getting her best reviews since Out of Sight.

It and Hustlers combined to account for about 2/3rds of the weekend boxoffice, leaving the remaining films to fight over scraps.  Joining the top two in a 1-through-4 sweep of the top slots by R-rated films were Angel Has Fallen, with a weekend gross of $4.5 million, and Good Boys, with a gross of $4.2 million.  Angel is now up to $60.5 million, and should pass the final gross of London Has Fallen any day now.  Meanwhile Boys has earned $73.3 million, and should pass $80 million in the next couple of weeks.

Spending its 9th weekend in the Top 5 is The Lion King, which brought in another $3.7 million for a total of $534.1 million.  That ties it with Star Wars: The Force Awakens, Black Panther, and Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle as the films with the second-longest stay in the Top 5 in the teens (the most is Frozen, with 11 weeks).  Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw slipped to sixth with $2.8 million.  Its gross is now $168.3 million.  Overcomer brought in $2.7 million, to bring its total to $29 million.

Opening in 8th is future My World of Flops casefile and future This Had Oscar Buzz episode subject The Goldfinch.  A heavy literary adaption was always going to be a hard sale, and once the scathing reviews started coming in from Toronto, this one was pretty much guaranteed to fail, though I don't think anyone thought it would fail this spectacularly.  The drama pulled in $2.7 million and seems unlikely to crack $10 million.

Finally making the Top 10 after several weeks of finishing just below is The Peanut Butter Falcon, which came in at 9th.  The dramady about a young man with Down Syndrome who dreams of becoming a professional wrestler and sets off on a journey to do exactly that, has emerged as one of the most successful independent films of the year so far.  This weekend, it earned $1.8 million to bring its total to $15 million, and it should get past $20 million before it's all said and done.

At #10 is Dora and the Lost City of Gold, which has bounced around the bottom of the Top 10 for several weeks now.  It grossed $1.8 million to bring its gross to $56.7 million.

Three new films go wide this weekend to challenge It and Hustlers for the top spot.  Ad Astra is a sci-fi drama about an astronaut, played by Brad Pitt, trying to solve the mystery of his missing father, played by Tommy Lee Jones.  Its the odds-on favorite to win the weekend, but could face a challenge from Rambo: Last Blood.  After spending a good chunk of the teens playing Rocky Balboa, Sylvester Stallone revives John Rambo and sends him to Mexico to take on a drug cartel.  Given the history of the franchise, its probably a wise idea to take the "Blood" part of the title seriously.  Another contender is Downton Abbey, a feature film continuation of everyone's favorite British historical soap opera.  Whether any of them can successfully challenge It or even Hustlers for the top spot, we'll find out next week.