Home Entertainment Weekend Box Office Report – Hidden Figures takes off while everything else stumbles

Weekend Box Office Report – Hidden Figures takes off while everything else stumbles

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This weekend past saw the US celebrating a public holiday in honour of Martin Luther King Jr., a man celebrated for fighting for the civil rights of those who were oppressed and disenfranchised. Fittingly, the weekend saw Hidden Figures, the true story of the African-American women engineers and mathematicians who worked for NASA and calculated the flight trajectories needed for the first human spaceflight program Project Mercury, also blast off to the top of the charts.

Although already in its fourth week, with recent awards nominations, including two Golden Globes, Hidden Figures surged to a strong $20.45 million – a figure that jumps up to $25 million once you take the earnings of the extra holiday into account. That one weekend tally is actually about the same as what it’s done in the previous three weeks!

And it appears that La La Land also benefited from some awards love. After cleaning up at the Golden Globes, Damien Churzel’s critically lauded musical saw its income jump a pretty big 43% in its sixth week. As far as newcomers are concerned, The Bye Bye Man, Monster Trucks and Sleepless all debuted this weekend past, while Patriots Day and Ben Affleck’s Live By Night both expanded from the tiny handful of cinemas they had opened in last week, to a full wide release. And they all performed rather blandly.

Horror thriller The Bye Bye Man at least managed to see a profit from its $13.38 million debut, purely due to its low price tag of $7.4 million. Sleepless (aka Jamie Foxx wants his own Taken franchise) could also only scrounge up $8.46 million despite a solid Cinemascore of B+. Patriots Day has also been pulling in solid reviews (including our own), but it seems the American people were not all that interested in reliving their personal tragedy on the big screen as the film topped out the weekend at $12 million. Meanwhile Ben Affleck saw the first stumble of his directing career with Live By Night. Critics have not been kind to the period gangster drama, and audiences followed suit as it couldn’t even crack the top 10 with $5.42 million.

But of course all eyes were on Monster Trucks, the now infamous movie pitched by a Paramount executive’s four-year old son, and which the studio was expecting to tank bad enough to warrant a $115 million writedown three months before it was even released. And Monster Trucks definitely lived up to its super low expectations and then some as it bombed with a mere $10.5 million opening. With a $125 million price tag (which you can probably add another 50% on top of for advertising), the film’s international earnings are going to have to be monstrous to rescue this being one of the biggest flops of recent times.

Here’s what the rest of the US charts look like:

  • 01. Hidden Figures (NE)

Weekend gross: R20.45 million
Percentage change: NA
Domestic gross: R54.83 million
Worldwide gross: NA

  • 02. La La Land (LW: 5)

Weekend gross: R14.5 million
Percentage change: +43.2%
Domestic gross: R90 million
Worldwide gross: $128.88 million

  • 03. Sing (LW: 3)

Weekend gross: R13.81 million
Percentage change: -33.3%
Domestic gross: R233 million
Worldwide gross: $397.32 million

 

  • 04. Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (LW: 2)

Weekend gross: R13.75 million
Percentage change: .37.6%
Domestic gross: R498.85 million
Worldwide gross: $979.95 million

  • 05. The Bye Bye Man (NE)

Weekend gross: R13.37 million
Percentage change: NA
Domestic gross: R13.37 million
Worldwide gross: $14.678 million

  • 06. Patriots Day (LW: 30)

Weekend gross: R12 million
Percentage change: +11,350%
Domestic gross: R12.92 million
Worldwide gross: $12.92 million

  • 07. Monster Trucks (NE)

Weekend gross: R10.5 million
Percentage change: NA
Domestic gross: R10.5 million
Worldwide gross: $25.2 million

  • 08. Sleepless (NE)

Weekend gross: R8.46 million
Percentage change: NA
Domestic gross: R8.46 million
Worldwide gross: NA

  • 09. Underworld: Blood Wars (LW:4)

Weekend gross: R5.81 million
Percentage change: -57.5%
Domestic gross: R23.93 million
Worldwide gross: $70.73 million

  • 10. Passengers (LW: 6)

Weekend gross: R5.62 million
Percentage change: -36.2%
Domestic gross: R90 million
Worldwide gross: $237.1 million

With its weekend earnings, Rogue One: A Star Wars Story has now officially become the #1 domestic film of 2016, pushing Finding Dory off the top spot. The milestones continue as it is expected to bring in another $17 million from the public holiday, which will push it over the half billion mark as well, and likely see it cross $1 billion in the next few days.

(LW = Last Week, NE = New Entry)

Last Updated: January 23, 2017

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