“Beauty and the Beast” Premiere Looks to Break Box Office Records This Weekend
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Beauty and the Beast |
$152 million |
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Kong: Skull Island |
$27 million |
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Logan |
$20 million |
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Get Out |
$15 million |
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The Shack |
$6.3 million |
Predictions for Disney’s highly anticipated Beauty and the Beast are wide-ranging, but one thing is for sure: It’s going to be the biggest opening of the year so far. Industry estimates have the film opening in the $120 – $130 million range but advanced ticket sales, a strong marketing campaign, and the powerhouse that is Disney instead point to a much stronger opening for the film. Instead, there’s a good chance the live-action remake will be able to surpass the $130 million mark, possibly even $150 million, and break some records in the process.
Currently, Finding Dory holds the record for the highest opening of a PG film, making $135 million in its first weekend last year. There’s a good chance Beauty and the Beast will top this opening, but the other record is another story entirely. Last year’s Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice became the largest March opening of all time with a $166 million premiere. If this new Disney blockbuster tops that it would be big news indeed and while the film will likely open higher than the lowball predictions, it would be a stretch for it to best the Warner Bros. superhero flick. Still, its early ticket sales, according to Fandango, are already in the range of BvS as well as Captain America: Civil War, which opened to $179 million.
In terms of Disney’s slate of live-action films, Beauty and the Beast is also expected to become the highest opening there as well, besting the likes of all their modern live-action films from Alice in Wonderland and Maleficent to the more recent Cinderella, The Jungle Book, and Pete’s Dragon. This should come as no surprise for many reasons. Beauty and the Beast boasts a star-studded cast, of course, but it’s also the first of Disney’s popular Renaissance films to get the live-action remake treatment, not to mention it’s arguably the most popular of the Renaissance films as well. So expect to see this tale as old as time easily take the box office and likely with a much bigger opening that some estimates place it at.
Opening Weekend | Current Gross | Facebook Likes | Tweets | |
Beauty and the Beast | N/A | N/A | 16,692,685 | 499,797 |
Kong: Skull Island | $61m | $77.3m | 67,798 | 156,528 |
Logan | $88.4m | $163.7m | 71,051 | 239,636 |
Get Out | $33.3m | $117.8m | 33,398 | 235,276 |
The Shack | $16.1m | $35.5m | 13,524 | N/A |
Following far behind Beauty and the Beast, but still doing rather well for themselves, are the three films that haven proven to have a very successful start to the year: Kong: Skull Island, Logan, and Get Out. For the former, the Vietnam-era action movie about a giant ape is set to drop a little less than 60 percent, which is on average for big, action blockbusters. The film, which is a little over $160 million worldwide, will likely cross the $100 million mark domestically this weekend, although it’s still pacing behind the success of Logan. Speaking of, that film is also looking at a drop over 50 percent, but closer to the 50 mark than 60. It should also cross $180 million domestically and get close to $500 million worldwide.
For the latter film, it’s set to continue its success by dropping only 25 percent or so. It’s officially the fastest Blumhouse film and film helmed by a black director to reach $100 million domestically. In just two weeks, it should also be Blumhouse’s best film of all time, topping M. Night Shyamalan’s Split, which is currently at $136 million. The mass success of Get Out is not something to brush aside — it’s Jordan Peele’s directorial debut, was only made for $4.5 million, and both challenges and comments on various gender and racial themes in innovative ways.
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Rotten Tomatoes | IMDb | Metacritic | ||
Critics | Users | Stars | ||
Beauty and the Beast | 67 | N/A | 6.4 | 66 |
Kong: Skull Island | 79 | 76 | 7.1 | 62 |
Logan | 92 | 93 | 8.6 | 77 |
Get Out | 99 | 89 | 8.3 | 83 |
The Shack | 18 | 86 | 6.7 | 32 |
Bringing up the rear is the faith-based film The Shack, which will likely drop around 32 percent or so, making a little over $6 million. It’s currently the thirteenth-highest Christian film and after this weekend, could possibly rise enough to make its way into the top ten and if not this weekend, then next — and don’t doubt that Octavia Spencer’s presence in the film is a huge part of the film’s success.
The other new film of the weekend, the horror film The Belko Experiment, opening in a little over 1,300 theaters, is slated to open between $3.5 and $4 million. The LEGO Batman Movie, Hidden Figures, Before I Fall, and John Wick: Chapter 2 will make up the rest of the top ten.
Elsewhere in box office news, Disney’s most recent original animated film, Moana, will cross $600 million worldwide. While not the $1 billion marks both Zootopia and Frozen reached, or even the $657 million global total that Big Hero 6 achieved, it’s still an impressive showing for the film. It does top several of the other films in Disney’s current Revival era, such as Tangled, Wreck-It Ralph, and The Princess and the Frog.
(Sources: boxoffice.com, boxofficemojo.com, rottentomatoes.com, imdb.com, metacritic.com. Tweets and Likes represent figures for this week only. Figures represent numbers at time of writing, and may have changed. Tracking Board does not report Rotten Tomatoes user ratings for movies that have not yet seen wide release.)
Anya Crittenton | Associate Editor