A movie based on the old video game Sonic the Hedgehog seemed like an odd idea this day and age, some twenty-odd years after the character's heyday. Worries about the film grew when a teaser poster was released in late 2018, showing an outline of Sonic with legs that seemed more at home on Usain Bolt than on a cartoon animal. Then, the film's first trailer hit a few months later, and the world was collectively horrified by the Sonic present in the trailer, who looked less like the video game character and more like a weird blue humanoid complete with a mouth full of human teeth. Amazingly, Paramount took the widespread criticism to heart and announced that there would be a wholesale redesign of Sonic before the movie came out, an action that ultimately required the film to be pushed back three months, from November to February.
That turned out to be a wise move. When the first trailer with the new and improved Sonic arrived, audiences were much more complimentary. And now that the film itself has arrived, it easily outraced all expectations to open over the 4-day President's Day weekend to a whopping $70 million, easily taking #1 by a wide margin, and already 2020's third-highest grossing film, trailing only Bad Boys for Life and, by less than $2 million, fellow talking animal family comedy Dolittle. It also easily beat out the opening for Pokemon Detective Pikachu from last May to be the best opening for a video game-inspired film ever. When it hits $100 million, probably sometime next weekend, it will be Jim Carrey's first $100 million grosser since A Christmas Carol in 2009, and his first live-action $100 million grosser since Fun With Dick and Jane in 2005. It will also bring an end to a awful streak by Paramount, which hasn't had a $100 million grosser since Bumblebee. On top of all that, it is one the best-reviewed video game movie of all time, in that critics actually seemed to like it (only Detective Pikachu and The Angry Birds Movie 2 have higher Rotten Tomatoes scores).
Coming in second is a film that was expected to be taking the path that Sonic is taking. Instead, Birds of Prey (And the Superlong Title I'm Not Going to Bother Checking) earned $19.7 million, for an 11-day total of $61.9 million. To be fair, this is a OK two-week total given what it opened to, but it's still a long way to $100 million for Harley Quinn.
Opening in third was the low-budget horror thriller Fantasy Island. The remake of the old TV show did all right business, opening to $13.8 million over the four days. Being a horror title, it will likely sink fast and finish around $30 million at best, but it will still be profitable.
Just behind it in fourth was another newcomer, The Photograph. The romantic drama was strong on Friday, which was Valentine's Day, but faded quite a bit as the weekend went on, for a four-day total of $13.3 million. It should have better legs than Fantasy Island, but it likely is also heading toward a final gross in the $30 million neighborhood.
Bad Boys For Life, which for now remains the highest-grossing film of 2020, came in 5th with $13.1 million. Its gross is up to $183.1 million. It should cross $200 million in the next few weeks.
Best Picture loser 1917 wasn't badly hurt by being upset, as it came in with $9.4 million, upping its total to $145.8 million. Another 2019 film still hanging around the Top 10, Jumanji: The Next Level celebrated its 10th week on the chart by passing $300 million. The film took in $6.8 million for a total of $306.8 million.
In its 19th week in American theaters, Best Picture winner Parasite finally made the Top 10, picking up $6.6 million for a total of $44.3 million. It is currently the fourth-biggest grossing non-English language movie in US history, and with the final grosses of #3 Hero and #2 Life is Beautiful less than $13 million away, it seems highly likely that Parasite will pass them both in the coming weeks. It is highly unlikely, however, to be cable to catch #1 Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, which remains the one non-English language film to pass $100 million at the domestic box office.
Despite the opening of Sonic, Dolittle did pretty decent business, taking in $6.1 million for a gross of $71.6 million. It should pass $80 million in the next few weeks.
Despite the star power of Will Ferrell and Julia Louis-Dreyfus, the newly rechristened Searchlight Pictures seemed to go out of its way to avoid promoting Downhill, its new dramady about a married couple whose relationship unravels after he seems to abandon her and their kids to an avalanche. Audiences took the studio up on its apathy, as the film opened to only $5.1 million. The people who did go see it hated it, as it scored a D on Cinemascore. That's not quite The Grudge bad, and its box office isn't quite Rhythm Section bad, but still, this is pretty bad. It seems likely to finish as Ferrell's worst-grossing wide release since at least The Ladies Man. At least the two stars seemed to have a lot of fun promoting the film.
Two new films go wide this weekend. Likely to finish second behind Sonic is the latest remake of Jack London's The Call of the Wild, about a domestic dog at the turn of the last century that gets sent off to the Yukon and falls in with a crusty but good-hearted prospector, played by Harrison Ford. Also opening is yet another cheap horror film (the sixth of the year, even though its only the 8th weekend), Brahms: The Boy II. The first Boy was an unexpected success four years ago, grossing $35.8 million, but hasn't exactly lingered in the public imagination. We'll see if this one can overachieve as well, and if Sonic can race pass $100 million, this coming weekend.
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