In terms of the title kind of sucks,I can thinking nothing in my mind. Anyways, it’s time for a new prediction for the weekend box office, and we see the release of three wide releases: The Girl on the Train, The Birth of a Nation, and Middle School: The Worst Years of My Life. So let’s go through what I believe will be the top five films of the box office this weekend.
Starting with Girl on the Train, which easily has the most buzz of the three wide releases. With stars like Emily Blunt, Haley Bennett, Rebecca Ferguson, Justin Theroux, Luke Evans, and Allison Janney, just to name a few, and a high-profile marketing campaign, (it’s pretty much advertised as this season’s Gone Girl (2014)) and some have even said it could be a huge player at the Oscars. It’s tracking for $24 million, and while critics have been pretty much split down the middle on the film with 45% on the Rotten Tomatoes site. I’ll go with $25 million, right round expectations. I think it could do better, but with so many films being over-shot for my predictions, so I’ll low-ball it a bit. Well actually, $24 vs $25 million? Anyways it opens in 3,144 theaters and should average $7,952 per theater.
In second place, a holdover: Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children. The film was a little under what I thought it’d do last weekend, but with almost 200 more theaters playing it this weekend, I’ll say a 45% drop for second place with $15.8 million. Third place I believe will be another holdover, Deepwater Horizon. The word of mouth has been pretty good, and again it didn’t hold up to expectations last weekend, but with different target demographics for all three of these movies, it should also see a good holdover. I say a 40% drop and a second weekend total of $12.1 million.
Surprisingly I have to put Birth of a Nation in fourth place, though a couple of months ago I would have said it could rival what I think Miss Peregrine will make for a second place finish, but with the whole debacle that director, star, co-writer and co-producer Nate Parker has come under, I think it hurt, plus there’s a certain lack of buzz with general audiences. I’m sure that the awards audiences will be going this weekend, but your average moviegoer might not go right away. I say it earns about $8.5 million this weekend, which should be enough for fourth. Tracking has it at about $10 million, so there is potential for it to hit higher, and it opens in 2,105 theaters. It should average $4,038 per theater.
In fifth place I’m putting my money on The Magnificent 7, which should fall about an even 50% this weekend and total $7.8 million. If Birth of a Nation does really under-perform this weekend and Magnificent 7 does better than I suspect, it could easily earn fourth place, so this is one to watch. Also opening is Middle School, which probably won’t earn too much. I feel almost no buzz around the film, and even kids are more looking forward to seeing Miss Peregrine if they haven’t already. It has been tracking for around $5.5 million, which just sounds too high for me, but what do I know? I’m putting it at $4 million even, around sixth or seventh place, depending on where Sully and Storks land.
So yeah, there’s no guarantees for what will happen this weekend, with the probable exception of the top two or three, but here’s how I did last week: Miss Peregrine did take number one, but it didn’t quite catch $35 million, instead earning $28.8 million, so I was off about 18%. Second place was also correctly predicted for Deepwater Horizon, and it earned $20.2 million, lower than my $28 million prediction, off 28%, so that was one that I could have done better on. I was 100% right on third place, Magnificent 7, both with the spot and the total, $15.6 million. I won’t gloat too much because I could have done better for the first two spots. Fourth place went to Storks, which went down a lower percentage than I thought: 36% instead of 45% like I predicted. Sully was also correctly predicted for fifth place with an $8.8 million prediction and a $8.2 million result, off 38%, so nothing to complain about there. By the way, my $8.5 million prediction for Masterminds was kind of off the mark. As you can probably count, I didn’t have it in the top five, but with $6.5 million actual. So there, I’ve had a couple of good weeks. I’ll try to keep that up.