Legendary Picture’s Godzilla, which was directed by Gareth Edwards, stormed past expectations of a $65 million debut to post a $93.2 million bow, the second best of 2014 so far, trailing only Captain America: The Winter Soldier’s $95 million opening.  Godzilla’s debut surpassed that of Amazing Spider-Man 2 and was the sixth best ever for a "non-sequel," though with a property as familiar as Godzilla, the “non-sequel” tag appears to be something of a misnomer, even though it might be technically correct. 

Godzilla’s massive debut could pose something of a threat to Fox’s X-Men: Days of Future Past, which opens next week, if the giant monster displays solid "legs" over the next few weeks. 

Whatever happens in future weeks, the big guy’s potent debut gave Hollywood its first year-over-year victory of the summer season, a 15.2% bump over the same frame last year, when Star Trek Into Darkness debuted with $70 million.
 
As one might expect males dominated the audience for Godzilla (58%), which was also, given the age of the property, older, with 60% of the opening weekend crowd over 25.  The new Godzilla film fared well with the critics who gave it a current 72% positive rating on review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes.  Opening weekend audiences gave the film an OK "B+" CinemaScore, but gauging word-of-mouth appears to be a bit difficult in this case, since the film has detractors who have made their feelings known on social media.  Godzilla’s massive Friday total of $38.5 million (that includes a solid $9.5 million from Thursday) was solidly ahead of Winter Soldier’s $36.9 million, but the big guy’s lead over the Cap sequel evaporated over Saturday and Sunday showings.  The big question is how will Godzilla fare next weekend in direct competition with the debuting X-Men: Days of Future Past?
 

Weekend Box Office (Studio Estimates): May 16-18, 2014
	Film	Weekend Gross	Screens	Avg./ Screen	Total Gross	Wk#
1	Godzilla	$93,205,000	3,952	$23,584	$93,205,000	1
2	Neighbors	$25,991,000	3,311	$7,850	$91,517,000	2
3	The Amazing Spider-Man 2	$16,800,000	3,991	$4,209	$172,170,000	3
4	Million Dollar Arm	$10,511,000	3,019	$3,482	$10,511,000	1
5	The Other Woman	$6,300,000	3,054	$2,063	$71,664,000	4
6	Heaven is for Real	$4,400,000	2,893	$1,521	$82,249,000	5
7	Rio 2	$3,800,000	2,371	$1,603	$118,051,000	6
8	Captain America: The Winter Soldier	$3,759,000	2,271	$1,655	$250,627,000	7
9	Legends of Oz: Dorothy's Return	$1,952,000	2,578	$757	$6,559,000	2
10	Moms' Night Out	$1,900,000	1,046	$1,816	$7,327,000	2

Not surprisingly Godzilla did very well in large format screenings (the way the film should be seen) with IMAX contributing 14.1% of the weekend total and 47 PLF theaters providing another 9.1%.  3-D showings also were a key to Godzilla’s strong debut, accounting for 51% of the movie’s first weekend earnings.  Godzilla also gave Warner Bros. its biggest May opening ever, and points up the fact that the loss of Legendary, the production company that financed 75% of Godzilla, will have real repercussions for Warners (see "Legendary Goes to Universal").
 
With its strong debut it is difficult to see how Godzilla won’t be able to make back its $160 million cost, unless the film is total dud overseas.  The movie opened in most world markets this weekend with delays slated only for China and Japan, where the film won’t open until August because of the filmmakers’ fears of a backlash against the latest Hollywood version of the iconic Japanese monster movie brand.  Final numbers from Godzilla’s overseas debut are not in yet, but it appears that the movie easily won the global box office derby by earning at least $103 million and bringing its global total to $196.2 million.  Just how much money the film will eventually make will depend on how it fares over the coming weeks.
 
Second place went to last weekend’s winner, the comedy Neighbors, which dropped 47% as it added $26 million to its domestic total, which reached $91.5 million.  Neighbors should flash well over $100 million by this time next weekend.
 
Marc Webb’s The Amazing Spider-Man 2 dropped 54% in its third frame as it earned $16.2 million and brought its domestic total to $172.1 million.  Domestically it is hard to see ASM 2 ending up with much over $200 million, but fortunately for Sony the film continues to do well overseas where it earned another $31.5 million and brought its non-U.S. total to $461 million.  ASM 2 is doing especially well in China where it has brought in $78.5 million already.
 
The only other movie to open wide this weekend was Disney’s offbeat sports movie Million Dollar Arm.  The family friendly film focuses on a sports agent (played by Mad Men’s John Hamm) who travels to India to find pitching talent for American baseball among the sub-continent’s many cricket bowlers.  Couples made up the majority (68%) of the audience for Million Dollar Arm, which earned a disappointing $10.5 million.  So-so reviews (59% positive on Rotten Tomatoes) may have hurt the modestly-budgeted film ($25 million), which will need to generate good word-of-mouth to stay relevant over the next few weeks.
 
With Godzilla sucking much of the oxygen out of the room there wasn’t a lot left for the films on the bottom half of the top ten chart, though it should be noted that Captain America: The Winter Soldier earned $3.8 million to bring its total to $250.6 million.  Within the next few weeks The Winter Soldier should catch and surpass The LEGO Movie ($253.8 million) and become the highest-grossing film of 2014, though the Cap sequel likely won’t wear the crown for long.
 
Be sure to check back next week to see if X-Men: Days of Future Past can knock Godzilla out of the top spot and how the Adam Sandler/Drew Barrymore family comedy Blended will fare in a marketplace where most of the family film entries are already quite long in the tooth.

--Tom Flinn