While Finding Dory’s $136.2 million weekend take was still shy of the inflation-adjusted totals for Shrek the Third in 2007 ($151 million) and Shrek 2 in 2004 ($149 million), it represents a new inflation-adjusted high for a Pixar film. The question remains as to how “front-loaded” Finding Dory will be? Traditionally Pixar films have pretty big first weekend multipliers (the ratio of the film’s opening to its final domestic total). The lowest multiplier yet for a Pixar film was a “2.8” for the lackluster sequel Cars 2, and even that would see Finding Dory earning $383 million, while the average multiplier for the past 10 Pixar summer releases of around 3.8 would net the film $517.6 million, a number that seems quite unlikely, though it does indicate, that, at least for now, Finding Dory has to be considered as a contender for the highest-grossing film of 2016.
With strong reviews (currently 95% positive on review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes) and good word-of-mouth (Finding Dory received an “A” CinemaScore from opening weekend audiences), Finding Dory doesn’t appear as if it should taper off soon, though a strong marketing campaign as well as pent up interest in the sequel to the 2003 film Finding Nemo, which remains Pixar’s highest-grossing film (adjusted for inflation), undoubtedly inspired many to see the film right away.
With Finding Dory the full extent of the current “family audience” for theatrical showings here in North America may be discernable. Families made up 65% of the opening weekend audience for Finding Dory, while adults accounted for 26% and teens 9%. Like last week’s box office winner, The Conjuring 2, Finding Dory also successfully bucked this summer’s anti-sequel trend—and of course Dory’s success will help offset the losses from Disney’s Alice Through the Looking Glass (as will the mega-successes Zootopia, The Jungle Book, and Captain America: Civil War).
Second place went to another new film, Central Intelligence, an action-comedy that pairs funnyman Kevin Hart with action star Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson. Central Intelligence opened with $34.5 million, a solid enough debut, but still well below the premiere of $41.5 debut of Hart’s action comedy Ride Along. Central Intelligence earned a solid (especially for an action/comedy) critical rating of 66% positive on Rotten Tomatoes, and received an “A-“ CinemaScore from opening weekend audiences, so it has the potential to stick around for some time as well. The audience for Central Intelligence skewed slightly female (51%) and quite a bit older (57% over 25).
Last week’s winner, The Conjuring 2, took third place as it slid some 61.5%, the kind of sizable drop often suffered by horror films (though not by the first Conjuring film that slipped just 48%), but this $40 million production is doing well overseas where it earned another $41.9 million for a foreign total of $116.2 million and a global haul of $187.9 million.
Now You See Me 2, which posted an OK debut last week, dropped 57% as it earned $9.7 million to bring its domestic total to $41.4 million. The jury is still out on the prospects for this film to make up overseas for a relatively small (for a 2016 sequel) decline in its opening total from those of its predecessor.
The news on the domestic front for Legendary Pictures’ MMORPG adaptation Warcraft was simply brutal, a 73% drop that is the third biggest second weekend decline on record for a film in 3000 or more theaters. Don’t look for this turkey to be on 3000 screens for long. Fortunately for Legendary, Warcraft is doing boffo business in China, where it has now earned $205 million, though only $49 million of that came in the past week. The $160 million production has now earned $377.6 million worldwide, surpassing the $336 million of Disney’s Prince of Persia in 2010 and earning the dubious distinction of “the most successful video game movie ever.” However, given the film’s enormous cost (an admitted $160 million), and the fact that studios only receive one-third of the film’s gross earnings in China (versus roughly 50% here in North America), it appears unlikely that a Warcraft 2 will be produced on the same budgetary scale.
Fox’s X-Men: Apocalypse lost almost a thousand theaters and will likely lose more in the coming weeks. It added $5.2 million to bring its domestic total to $146 million. By next week it should surpass the raw (not adjusted) total of X-Men: First Class ($146.4 million), but that has to be seen as a domestic disappointment for a film with an A-list cast and a $178 million production budget. X-Men: Apocalypse is doing better overseas, and has now earned $510 million worldwide, but it doesn’t have a prayer of matching the performance of its X-Men predecessor, X-Men: Days of Future Past ($747.9 million).
Also continuing to underperform is Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows, the latest film from another franchise that is swimming in the waters of box office mediocrity. The second TMNT film from Michael Bay’s production company cost $135 million to produce, has earned just $72 million here, and is set to hemorrhage theaters as competition heats up over the next few weeks. So far Out of the Shadows hasn’t made much noise yet overseas, though it is yet to open in some prime territories, so the jury is still out, but the prognosis is not very hopeful for either the film or the live-action TMNT franchise.
Disney took the last two spots in the top ten with the bomb Alice Through the Looking Glass, which will likely finish its domestic run with around $75 million, and 2016’s top superhero film so far, Captain America: Civil War, which has earned $401.3 million at the domestic box office, the best total of any film in 2016 so far.
Be sure to check back here next week when two more films open nationwide, the sequel to the 1996 blockbuster Independence Day, Independence Day: Resurgence and the historically accurate Civil War and Reconstruction drama The Free State of Jones.
