'Lego Movie 2' Comes Apart With $34M+ Opening; 'What Men Want' Solid With $19M In Another Blasé B.O. Weekend
An over-saturated kids franchise pic, an overdone action star, and a low budget horror film aren't really creating a stampede at theaters this weekend. We're hearing that it's the lowest post-Super Bowl weekend in ten years. That's how much overall business stinks.
It's been weeks–literally since the holidays–since we've had a multitude of pics hit the marquee, and this is what we get: A whole-lotta ho-hum. Next week offers more of the same, specifically quality challenged fare, with the very expensive $170M-plus pic Alita: Battle Angel, another horror movie, Happy Death 2U, and Isn't It Romantic. Captain Marvel, seriously, where are you??
Paramount's What Men Want is doing respectable business in regards to its $20M cost (before P&A), with a studio-reported $19M weekend in second place off a $6.6M opening day. The result is a huge improvement for Oscar nominee Taraji P. Henson whose Proud Mary wasn't so happy last year with a low $9.9M opening. The R-rated comedy has the best audience reaction out of all the wide entries on PostTrak, with 4.5 stars and an 82% positive and a 69% recommend. African-Americans repped 41% of all moviegoers, followed by 28% Caucasian, 18% Hispanic and 7% Asian. This gender-flipped redo played best on the East Coast, along with the South. On CinemaScore, the Adam Shankman-directed comedy earned an 'A' from its core female audience and an A- from men. The A- is the same as Night School and About Last Night. Based on Comscore's PostTrack, the audience skewed female at 62% versus male at 38%. By age, the audience skewed older, with 67% over 25, but the majority were between 18-34 (62%).
Many believed that The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part could do $50M+, $40M+ at the very least. Not so with a studio-reported opening weekend of $34.4M. With those pre-Thursday previews, the result is $35M. While the result is +69% over Ninjago's $20.4M, it's down a huge 50% from the first 2014 movie, and -35% from Lego Batman. It's also far below those $50M-$55M projections from early this week. Business, thanks to matinees, was +83% on Saturday over Friday with $15.6M. The spike isn't good enough for what they turned in on Friday.
The Second Part played best in the west, midwest, and Canada. But even there, it was below expectations. Overall, PostTrak is 4 stars, which means audiences are enjoying The Second Part. Kids under 12 love it more at 4.5 stars and a 70% definite recommend. General audiences repped 43%, kids 39%, and parents 18%.
The next two wide entries are essentially balance sheet transactions, intended to make some cash, and not intended to over-index at the box office. Lionsgate's Cold Pursuit isn't running cold at the box office because of the headlines from Liam Neeson's reported racist statements; it's doing an estimated $10.8M per Lionsgate because he's made way too many man-with-the-gun movies. The result is $200K shy of the $11M opening for the actor's March 2015 Run All Night (which hooked an A- CinemaScore) and that finaled with a paltry $26.4M. Even though this one is supposed to have a Fargo tone, it looks like another man-with-the-gun movie…in the snow…with a snowplow. Neeson is in Nicolas Cage land now — in fact, he's been here for quite a while –where all of these pics have run their course stateside, and are financially structured for overseas audiences. Cold Pursuit's opening weekend is lower than last year's The Commuter ($13.7M, which only did a 2.6x multiple stateside for $36.3M, but made close to $120M WW off a $40M production cost). Both pics come to Lionsgate via a StudioCanal release deal. Lionsgate didn't shell out an MG, they just spent mid-teens for the P&A, and in regards to their books at the end of the day, they expect to break even, if not a bit better.
Three stars on PostTrak here. A low 42% definite recommend. Men over 25 came out at 44%, Females over 25 at 35%. Caucasians bought tickets at 59%, Hispanic at 17%, and African-Americans at 10%. Best play for the film was in the south and the west. CinemaScore doesn't come out until Monday nowadays. Save this one for the plane.
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