Jennifer Lawrence's Joy starpower couldn't match the double-teaming bankability from Will Ferrell and Mark Wahlberg for the comedy Daddy's Home but she's still got nothing to worry about as Hollywood's current most popular actress pulling in 17.5 million in Joy's opening weekend despite middling reviews, a glut of new wide releases, and two hot button limited bows, all hoping for those same Christmas dollars.
Meanwhile every movie in theaters is trying to stay visible under the galactic-sized shadows of The Force Awakens which has already topped half a billion in the US box office in record time and should leapfrog Jurassic World's once unthinkable $652 domestic gross pretty soon at this rate. We'll also know fairly soon if the Star Wars saga's sheer cultural size affects the Oscar race. The question is not fully restricted to whether it will be nominated for this or that or a wholla lotta that like the '77 starter-kit, but whether it will drown out conversations about the newer or the more struggling Oscar campaigns and we end up with less movement in the Oscar race from where we were in say, October, because people are thinking of little else than Star Wars right now.
BOX OFFICE WIDE
(Christmas Weekend)
01 Star Wars: The Force Awakens $153.5 (cum. $544.5) Review, parody fun Emo Kyle Ren
02 Daddy's Home $38.8 *new*
03 Joy $17.5 *new*
04 Sisters $13.8 (cum $37.1) Review
05 Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Road Chip $12.7 (cum. $39.3)
06 Concussion $11 *new* Review
07 The Big Short $10.5 (cum. $16) Review & SAG Ensemble
08 Point Break $10.2 *new*
09 The Hunger Games Finale $5.3 (cum. $264.6) Hunger Games & Oscar
10 Creed $4.6 (cum. $96.3) Review
Christmas proved to be a death wish for many awards hopefuls since behemoths like STAR WARS and talking points like HATEFUL EIGHT & THE REVENANT sucked all the oxygen out of the room for other films
BOX OFFICE LIMITED
Excluding previously wides
01 The Hateful Eight $4.5 100 screens *new* Twitter Review, Worst of Year
02 The Danish Girl $1.5 440 screens (cum. $3.2) Eddie Redmayne
03 Carol $1.0 180 screens (cum $2.8) Reviewish, Podcast, Its Genius
04 The Revenant $.4 4 screens *new* parody fun Revenant Bear
05 Youth $.3 149 screens (cum. $1) Review, Podcast, Jane Fonda
06 Mr Six $.2 30 screens *new*
07 Trumbo $.2 30 screens *new* Podcast, SAG Ensemble
08 Room $.08 100 screens (cum. $4.7) Premiere, FYC Production Design
09 45 Years $.06 3 screens *new* Charlotte Rampling
10 Macbeth $.04 30 screens (cum. $.8) Review, Podcast
WHAT DID YOU SEE THIS WEEKEND?