The Russo Brothers’ Captain America: The Winter Soldier remained the most popular film in North America for the third weekend in a row as it dropped just 35.5% while earning $26.6 million and bringing its domestic total to $201.5 million. The Christian-themed film Heaven Is for Real was a surprise third place finisher as it stomped all over the pricy science fiction misfire Transcendence, which bowed to a disappointing $11.1 million. Overall the top 12 films of this Easter weekend posted a solid 25.4% gain over the same weekend last year when the comic book-based Tom Cruise science fiction film Oblivion topped the charts with $37 million.Even as Captain America was continuing his dominating run in North America, another Marvel comic book hero, The Amazing Spider-Man 2, which debuts here on May 2nd, was topping the charts in 14 overseas markets where it opened and earned a very impressive $47 million. ASM 2 took in $15 million in the U.K., $, $11.1 million in Mexico. 6.2 million in Germany, $5.2 million in Australia, and $3.9 million in Spain.
Captain America: The Winter Soldier is now the #2 film released in 2014 in the North American market, trailing only The LEGO Movie ($252.4 million). But worldwide The Winter Soldier is easily the top 2014 film so far with a global total of $586.6 million.
Many analysts figured that the animated feature Rio 2 would take the box office crown over the family audience-friendly Easter weekend, but the film’s box office total remains stubbornly behind the 10-day cumulative of the first Rio film. With the franchise apparently fading on the domestic front, Rio 2 will have to make up the difference overseas.
This weekend’s biggest surprise was the Christian film Heaven Is for Real, the modestly-produced ($12 million cost) saga based on a book by a Midwestern pastor whose son claims to have seen heaven during a near-death experience. Heavily marketed through the evangelical community, Heaven Is For Real earned $21.5 million during its opening weekend. The film attracted an audience that was 62% female and 51% over 35. The past eight weeks have seen the release of four explicitly religious films, Son of God, God’s Not Dead, Noah, and Heaven Is for Real. All have been successful to varying degrees, which means that more Christian-themed movies will be hitting theaters years to come. Heaven Is for Real is also unlikely to go away anytime soon since the film earned a great "A" CinemaScore.
| Weekend Box Office (Studio Estimates): April 18-20, 2014 | ||||||
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| Film | Weekend Gross | Screens | Avg./ Screen | Total Gross | Wk# |
| 1 | Captain America: The Winter Soldier | $26,612,000 | 3,825 | $6,957 | $201,526,000 | 3 |
| 2 | Rio 2 | $22,500,000 | 3,975 | $5,660 | $75,363,000 | 2 |
| 3 | Heaven is for Real | $21,500,000 | 2,417 | $8,895 | $28,500,000 | 1 |
| 4 | Transcendence | $11,150,000 | 3,455 | $3,227 | $11,150,000 | 1 |
| 5 | A Haunted House 2 | $9,100,000 | 2,310 | $3,939 | $9,100,000 | 1 |
| 6 | Draft Day | $5,900,000 | 2,781 | $2,122 | $19,548,000 | 2 |
| 7 | Divergent | $5,750,000 | 2,486 | $2,313 | $133,915,000 | 5 |
| 8 | Oculus | $5,202,000 | 2,648 | $1,965 | $21,191,000 | 2 |
| 9 | Noah | $5,000,000 | 2,537 | $1,971 | $93,274,000 | 4 |
| 10 | God's Not Dead | $4,801,000 | 1,796 | $2,673 | $48,327,000 | 5 |
Unlike the modestly-budgeted Heaven Is for Real, Transcendence, which stars Johnny Depp, cost $100 million. Directed by Wally Pfister, who photographed the Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight Trilogy, Transcendence demonstrates once again that launching an original science fiction saga in contemporary Hollywood is a difficult task. Let’s hope the Wachowskis’ $150 million Jupiter Ascending, which is set to debut in July, meets a kinder fate. The audience for Transcendence was 54% male, and 56% over 25. Unfortunately for the producers of Transcendence opening weekend crowds gave the film a miserable "C+" CinemaScore.
Also opening this weekend were the horror/comedy sequel A Haunted House 2 and the Disney nature film Bears. Haunted House 2 earned just half of what the original film made ($9.1 million vs. $18 million), but the Wayans brothers are still doing all right since the movie cost just $3 million to make.
Disney’s Bears features outstanding nature photography combined with cornball commentary (provided here by John C. Reilly). While far from the best “nature” documentaries, these Disney films represent just about the only contemporary examples of what once was a potent movie genre (that has long ago migrated to TV). Bears earned just $4.7 million and debuted outside the top ten at #11, which is especially bad since a portion of the opening weekend’s earnings was earmarked for our National Parks, which are taking it on the chin from cuts imposed by the sequester and years of austerity.
Among the holdover titles, Divergent continues to demonstrate strong “legs” at the domestic box office as the teen saga fell just 22.1%, earning $5.75 million and bringing its North American total to $134 million.
The religious themes of Noah (#9, $5 million) and God’s Not Dead (#10, $4.8 million) definitely helped the films do well over the Easter weekend as they posted modest drops of 33% and 13% respectively.
Check back here next week to catch the results of the final weekend session before the official start of the summer movie season on May 2nd. Film’s bowing next week include the female-centric revenge comedy The Other Woman, the late Paul Weller’s Brick Mansions, and the horror/thriller The Quiet Ones.
