Your Complete Weekend Box Office Tracking, Predictions, & Analysis (10.06.16)

	The Girl on the Train	$27.3 million
	Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children	$15 million
	Deepwater Horizon	$11 million
	The Birth of a Nation	$8.2 million
	The Magnificent Seven	$7.3 million

The two biggest questions regarding this weekend’s box office are whether or not Hurricane Matthew will seriously affect numbers and how the controversy surrounding Nate Parker and The Birth of a Nation will affect audience turnout if at all. Regarding the first matter, while the hurricane will only affect a handful of states, theater chains including AMC, Regal, Cinemark, and Cobb Theaters have already announced they will be closing certain locations from Florida to South Carolina. This likely will not have too big of an impact on overall numbers, but it could cause a slight dip because even with the locations that remain open in those states, people probably won’t want to be leaving their houses too much over the weekend.

Universal Pictures

Regardless, Emily Blunt’s new vehicle The Girl on the Train is set to come in first by a large stretch. The film is being compared to Gone Girl, given it’s based on a book, features a complex female lead, and is a psychological thriller that promises twists and turns. However, reviews are not being nearly as kind to Girl on the Train as they were to Gone Girl. Whereas the latter, which was helped by the names of Ben Affleck and David Fincher being attached to it, earned an 88 percent on Rotten Tomatoes, the former currently boasts a 44 percent. Granted, statistics show a gender divide over this film, with more female critics liking the film than male critics (Rotten Tomatoes features more male critics than female, so that could definitely be playing a part). It will trail Gone Girl’s opening of $37.5 million but is tracking to do better than films like Prisoners, another psychological thriller that opening in late September of 2013 to $20.8 million, and will likely be one of Blunt’s better opening weekends, running near parallel to Edge of Tomorrow and coming in shy of the Disney musical Into the Woods. It’s not very likely that mixed reviews will keep too many people away from this film as it’s the exact sort of thriller, where the reviews don’t reveal much of anything that all, that ignites audiences’ curiosity.

	Opening Weekend	Current Gross	Facebook Likes	Tweets
The Girl on the Train	N/A	N/A	186,478	23,718
Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children	$28.871 million	$34.739 million	83,583	89,115
Deepwater Horizon	$20.223 million	$25.439 million	14,689	41,976
The Birth of a Nation	N/A	N/A	53,410	9,233
The Magnificent Seven	$34.703 million	$65.644 million	9,281	14,129

Coming in second and third places, trailing the first place film of the weekend by likely more than $10 million, will be Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children and Deepwater Horizon, both in their second weeks. Except for the scourge of Dark Shadows, Tim Burton films tend not to fall more than 50 percent in their second weekends, so Miss Peregrine should likely be able to land in second place pretty safely. Plus, it’s getting decent reviews, doesn’t have much in the way of competition from other family films, and is adding another 183 theaters to its docket, which is helpful. Deepwater isn’t getting a theater count change and while it’s performed relatively okay during the week, it won’t make any big numbers this weekend. It’s a little worrying, given the film’s massive $110 million budget and the fact that it’s made so little money overseas right now (only $12 million). There’s a good chance this film won’t see much in the way of profit and that’s always a bad stain when it comes to Hollywood and the fact that this is a town that puts so much emphasis on money and business.

Fox Searchlight

Speaking of money and business, The Birth of a Nation is the film everyone’s eyes will be on this weekend, even if they don’t go see it. Purchased by Fox Searchlight for an unprecedented $17.5 million at Sundance, the film has found itself neck-deep and treading water in the wake of the controversy surrounding actor-director-writer Nate Parker’s rape case from 1999. It’s currently tracking to make between $7 and $9 million, which is great given its $10 million budget (although not so much with the $17.5 million purchase), and on par with similar films such as Free State of Jones (opened to $7.5 million) and 12 Years a Slave (which never saw a weekend higher than $6.6 million and that was in its fourth week of release). It’s also worth noting the film is opening in 2,105 theaters, as opposed to The Girl on the Train’s 3,144. While based on various articles and reactions around the internet, and IMDB users’ rating of 4.8, it seems audiences are already protesting the film, reviews are decent, and there are undoubtedly people who will see this film in spite of its controversy for various reasons.

	Rotten Tomatoes			IMDb		Metacritic
	Critics	Users	# of Ratings	Stars	# of Ratings
The Girl on the Train	44	N/A	103	6.7	1,195	47
Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children	64	66	20,213	7.2	11,371	57
Deepwater Horizon	83	88	24,886	7.6	8,499	68
The Birth of a Nation	77	N/A	102	4.8	2,381	75
The Magnificent Seven	63	79	29,992	7.2	24,236	54

The last film in the top five is a toss-up between The Magnificent Seven and the Warner Bros. animated flick Storks. However, I’m going to give the edge to Antoine Fuqua’s western remake because it’s a blockbuster, has plenty of star appeal, and Storks has competition in the way of Miss Peregrine and the fact that films like Zootopia are on Netflix. Even if it drops 50 percent, it will still be tracking in the $7 million plus range and I think that will be able to keep it in the top five.

Other films set to make a statement in the top ten is newcomer Middle School, which is opening in 2,822 but has had virtually no marketing campaign and won’t be able to hold a candle to other family films that are currently out. It’s comparable to the Wimpy Kid franchise but with far less weight and should make between $5 and $6 million this weekend. Mainstays like Sully and possibly even Don’t Breathe could stay in the top ten, as well as the comedy Masterminds, which came out last weekend but more or less bombed, only making $6.5 million in its opening weekend.

(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