American Sniper, which garnered six Oscar nods altogether, earned more on Friday ($30.2 million) than any previous Clint Eastwood-directed film had made during an entire opening weekend (Gran Turino, Clint’s previous best, debuted to $29.9 million back in 2008). Not surprisingly, given its subject matter, American Sniper played male (57%) and older (63% over 25 years old), and the film is by no means done, having earned an excellent "A+" CinemaScore from opening weekend audiences. Current projections have American Sniper ending the MLK weekend with a total 4-day take of $105 million.
Warner Bros. did a superlative job of marketing American Sniper with gut-wrenching ad clips running in great profusion in broadcasts of key sporting events and demographically-relevant programs. Eastwood too deserves credit for crafting a film that has enough “war is hell” elements to mollify critics, while presenting an unapologetically pro-American soldier worldview, which, like that of the highly successful Afghan War movie Lone Survivor in 2014, will result in wide viewership in what the coastal snobs refer to as "flyover" country. While most of the early film efforts based on the Iraq/Afghanistan conflicts failed at the box office, The Hurt Locker, Lone Survivor, and now American Sniper have all demonstrated that there is still plenty of box office potential in the war movie genre.
Second place went to Sony’s The Wedding Ringer, which put comedian Kevin Hart in the midst of a mostly white cast of second-tier actors like Josh Gad and TV star Kaley Cuoco (The Big Bang Theory). Hart hosted Saturday Night Live during the weekend, and that performance will probably help popularize his talents with white audiences more than The Wedding Ringer, which dropped during a weekend in which American Sniper sucked most of the air out of the room. Even with the stiff competition, The Wedding Ring managed to earn $21 million, one of the best January openings ever for an "R" rated comedy (Ride Along was "PG-13"). The Wedding Ringer cost just $23 million, and earned a solid "A-" CinemaScore, which means that its prospects for the future are also solid, given that comedies tend to have better “legs” than films from more heavily-hyped genres.
The U.K.-produced animated comedy Paddington came in a close third with as it earned and estimated $19.3 million. This film has already brought in $122 million overseas, so its U.S. run is basically gravy, but don’t be surprised if Paddington posts a big “multiple” of its first week earnings when its Stateside run is finally done. Paddington has a near perfect 98% positive rating on Rotten Tomatoes, and it earned an "A" CinemaScore from audiences, so a lengthy box office run is indicated here as well.
Fourth place went to last week’s winner, the action movie sequel Taken 3, which fell 64.2% in the face of direct competition for the action movie audience from American Sniper. There is no doubt that Taken 3 is already in the black, since the $48 million production has earned over $160 million worldwide so far.
The civil rights drama Selma, which also has amassed a stellar critical rating (99% positive), finished fifth with an estimated $8.3 million for the 3-day weekend. With its director and lead actor inexplicably snubbed by the Academy, it could be tough sledding in the weeks ahead for this historical drama about one of the watershed moments in 20th Century American history.
With its eight Oscar nods, the Alan Turing biopic The Imitation Game, added 45 theaters and nearly matched its last week earnings with an estimated 3-day total of $7.2 million. Oscar nominations do make a difference at this time of the year (see American Sniper) with films that got a number of nods like the Disney musical Out of the Woods holding up well, while movies that were largely snubbed like Angelina Jolie’s Unbroken, which slipped from fifth place to ninth, taking it on the chin.
This weekend has apparently also revealed the first big-budget bomb of 2015, the $70 million cyber-thriller Blackhat, which stars Chris Hemsworth (Thor) in a Michael Mann-directed, ripped-from-the-headlines hacker saga. The opening weekend demographics tell the tale of a film that dared to go head-to-head with American Sniper. Like Eastwood’s film, Blackhat drew an audience that was primarily male (59%) and older (82% over 25, 74% over 30). With a pitiful $4 million 3-day total, Blackhat, which earned a rotten "C" CinemaScore, would appear to be dead in the water. However, given its Hong Kong locations and key Chinese cast members, it might possibly do well enough in Asia to avoid a total financial loss for Universal.
Be sure to check back here next week to see if Johnny Depp’s Mordecai, the Lucasfilm animated film Strange Magic, or the prospect of Jennifer Lopez in the stalker-thriller The Boy Next Door will be enough to dislodge American Sniper from the top spot.
--Tom Flinn