Adam Sandler’s Pixels and John Green’s Paper Towns Were Trounced by Marvel Studios’ Ant-Man and Other Returning Movies
Normally, the summer is a time for tentpoles and blockbusters with lots of sequels and remakes bringing in tons of money. For the second weekend in a row, moviegoers were given a number of new movie properties, but unlike last weekend, none of the three new movies broke out with only one grossing over $20 million. So now you know why studios are so nervous about taking chances with new properties rather than just rehashing old ideas and releasing sequels.
After becoming Marvel Studios’ twelfth movie to open in the #1 spot, Ant-Man (Disney), starring Paul Rudd, Michael Douglas, Evangeline Lilly and Corey Stoll, retained its position in the top spot with $24.8 million, down 57% from its opening weekend with $106 million grossed in its first ten days. It added another $35.4 million overseas with openings in Germany, Spain and other territories to bring its global total to $226.5 million playing in 61% of international territories.
Adam Sandler’s video game action-comedy Pixels, co-starring Kevin James, Josh Gad, Peter Dinklage and Michelle Monaghan and directed by Chris Columbus, opened in second place with an estimated $24 million in 3,723 theaters or $6,446 per theater. It isn’t Sandler’s worst opening weekend (Blended and That’s My Boy opened much lower), but it’s nowhere near the $35 to 40 million openings that Sandler used to score on a regular basis. His next movie is the animated sequel Hotel Transylvania 2 in September, which will be a good test whether he can still score with family audiences.
Universal Pictures and Illumination Entertainment’s hit animated spin-off Minions took third place with $22 million, down another 55% from weekend to weekend, which isn’t good for a family film in the summer, and it’s not as if it has a ton of competition. Even so, it’s grossed $261 million in three weeks and that makes it the fifth-highest grossing movie of the year, and it still has a chance at hitting $300 million.
In its second weekend, the Amy Schumer-Judd Apatow rom-com Trainwreck (Universal), co-starring Bill Hader, Colin Quinn, John Cena, LeBron James, Tilda Swinton and Vanessa Bayer, dropped to fourth place with $17.3 million (down 42%) to bring its running total to $61.5 million.
Opening in just 2,772 theaters, Antoine (The Equalizer) Fuqua’s boxing drama Southpaw (The Weinstein Co.), starring Jake Gyllenhaal, Rachel McAdams, Forest Whitaker, 50 Cent and Oona Lawrence, debuted in fifth place with $16.5 million, or $5,952 per theater. That’s better than the $10.4 million for Gyllenhaal’s last drama Nightcrawler, for which he received similar Oscar buzz when it opened last October.
Adapted from John Green’s best-selling novel, 20th Century Fox’s Paper Towns, starring Nat Wolff and Cara Delevingne, was expected to do better this weekend based on the performance of Green’s The Fault in Our Stars last summer, but it was severely frontloaded, grossing $2 million in Thursday previews, another $4.3 million on Friday and then just $12.5 million for the weekend. That’s an average of $4,125 in 3,031 theaters putting it in sixth place behind Southpaw. (The production budget is reportedly $12 million, so it doesn’t have too far to go to be profitable.)
Pixar’s Inside Out and Universal Pictures’ Jurassic World continued to do well, grabbing seventh and eighth place respectively with $7.4 and $6.9 million. Inside Out has grossed $320 million domestically, the third-highest amount for a Pixar movie. It grossed another $28.3 million overseas this weekend in 51 territories bringing its global total to $550.1 million.
Jurassic World passed Marvel’s The Avengers to become the third-highest grossing movie domestically as it brought its North American total to $623.8 million. (Avengers grossed $623.4 million in North America in 2012, but even if Universal has overestimated Jurassic World for the weekend, it will surely take third place on Monday.) Jurassic World also holds the third place globally with a $1.54 billion world take.
Bill Condon’s drama Mr. Holmes (Roadside Attractions), starring Sir Ian McKellen and Laura Linney, expanded nationwide into 686 theaters on Friday. It earned $2.8 million over the weekend for ninth place, bringing its total to $6.4 million.
Lionsgate and Pantelion Films opened Marc Neveldine’s horror film The Vatican Tapes in 427 theaters on Friday where it grossed $850,000 for the weekend, or $1,991 per theater.
