Can You Ever Forgive the Box Office?
Sunday, November 11, 2018 at 10:14PM by Nathaniel R
Dear readers, we don't know why we relay the box office charts each week because they can be depressing. Films that should be giant hits are not and vice versa. With great regularity. We've learned to adjust our expectations so that now films that seem like giant hits made for adults are actually just modest hits if you compare them to year's past and so on. But for what it's worth here are this week's charts...
| Weekend Box Office Estimates (Nov 9-11) |
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| W I D E 800+ screens |
PLATFORM / LIMITED excluding prev. wide |
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| 1 Dr Seuss the Grinch $66 on 4141 screens *NEW* Posterized |
1 🔺 Can You Ever... $1.4 on 391 screens (cum. $3.6) Review, Podcast |
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| 2 Bohemian Rhapsody $30.8 on 4000 screens (cum. $100) Review, Podcast |
2🔺 Beautiful Boy $1.4 on 776 screens (cum. $5.1) Podcast |
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| 3 🔺 Overlord $10.1 on 2859 screens *NEW* |
3 Free Solo $774k on 266 screens (cum. $8.1) Critics Choice Winner |
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| 4 The Nutcracker and... $9.5 on 3766 screens (cum. $35.2) Review | 4🔺 Boy Erased $725k on 77 screens (cum. $997k) |
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| 5🔺The Girl in the Spider's Web $8 on 2929 screens *NEW* |
5 Suspiria $326k on 261 screens (cum. $1.9) Podcast |
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| 6 A Star is Born $8 on 2848 screens (cum. $178) Review, Soundtracking, Podcast |
6🔺A Private War $201k on 40 screens (cum. $283k) Eye Patches |
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| 7 Nobody's Fool $6.5 on 2468 screens (cum. $24.2) |
7🔺 Wildlife $142k on 106 screens (cum. $611k Review, Carey Mulligan |
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| 8 Venom $4.8 on 2351 screens (cum. $206.2) |
8🔺 Maria By Callas $97k on 26 screens (cum. $308k) |
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| 9 Halloween $3.8 (cum. $156.8) Review |
9 Colette $83k on 81 screens (cum. $4.9) Capsule, Podcast |
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| 10 The Hate U Give $2 (cum. $26.7) Review |
10 🔺 Burning $79k on 27 screens (cum. $198k) Review, Podcast, Foreign Film Chart |
| 🔺 = new or expanding theater count numbers (in millions unless otherwise noted) from box office mojo |
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Some notes...
• Though it's not necessarily common, the week's #1 movie also had the best per screen average. The Grinch made $15,000-ish per screen. The nearest rival was The Front Runner (which didn't make the limited release top ten) with $14,000ish per screen. The different is roughly 4,000 screens though, LOL.
• The Girl in the Spider's Web is not really a hit, opening with four million less than the David Fincher film 7 whole years ago which begs the question of why the studios didn't just bankroll Fincher and Mara to do a sequel way back when. His film has aged well, after all, and though it wasn't a giant hit it did alright and sequels tend to be safe bets (if you retain casts) since the franchise definitely still has name-brand awareness.
• Suspiria is already losing screens. Why on earth didn't they go bigger before Halloween?
• A Star is Born is now just 10 million shy of breaking into the top ten of 2018 where it will replace A Quiet Place before quickly being booted out by, oh i dunno, Aquaman or something. The Bradley Cooper / Lady Gaga Oscar hopeful has started to lose screens but it had (by far) the best hold of any of the top ten, down just 27% from last week. So after 6 weeks it still has legs though competition gets a LOT crazier next weekend.
What did you see this weekend or are you saving your pennies for the opening of WIDOWS and FANTASTIC BEASTS next weekend? The studios are gearing up for Thanksgiving now so it's big openings every weekend until the year is wrapped.
Reader Comments (31)
Saw Beautiful Boy.. very stirring movie great performances from all involved,,,, Maura Tierney was wonderful. Glad to see her used so well.
Aren’t movie theaters primarily for kid films now? I saw the Callas film (great for fans) and The Bodyguard with Richard Madden on Netflix is excellent.
Boy Erased. Much better than anticipated. Edgerton avoids a lot of cliches, and manages to treat people of faith without disdain. Hedges, Kidman, and Crowe deliver compelling work that carries over the weaker moments. Not great but totally solid.
Suspiria was really good until the end.
Saw Nutcracker and the Four Realms. What was hilarious was that I enjoyed it (knowing about the production problems made me forgiving) but my friend - who often makes fun of me for being overly critical of movies - hated it for every little thing and went on a rant that was, frankly, glorious to behold.
At some point this week, I will be watching The Last Picture Show, which came in via the Netflix.
saw First Man. The theater was PACKED, I thought this film bombed?
A well directed, dutifully acted, beautifully shot & compellingly scored complete bore of a film.
Also finally caught Coco on netflix. That film was awesome and a lot of fun.
I caught WILDLIFE - just. It opened in Sydney on 1 November and I was horrified to realise after a week it was only playing for 1 morning session a day at 1 cinema near me that I could find. A shame as I loved it and it really stayed with me. Beautifully composed and performed and an astute adaptation of the novel (which I've read, twice).
I also enjoyed BOHEMIAN RHAPSODY for the same reasons that everyone else seems to - Rami Malek + the music.
And an Australian black comedy, BROTHERS' NEST, that had a better-than-average script for an Australian film of its kind - until the ending.
Re-watches of Analyze This and Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy and first-timers in Les Dames du Bois de Boulogne and Filming Othello.
I'm just glad I saw Suspiria last week as I knew it wasn't going to stay at my multiplex for more than a week.
@Tom Ford
Primarily for kid films? I guess if you live in the country, otherwise there's something for everyone at the theater. I don't think Bohemian Rhapsody, Boy Erased, Overlord or Halloween are kid films.
I saw Beautiful Boy: dutiful acting and a few grace notes but altogether rather flat and uninspired. It's a film for parents, not drug addicts, and that's a real shame.
Also saw Outlaw King: rather pedestrian were it not for Aaron Taylor-Johnson who's an absolute hoot as a maniacal rebel.
I got to see Shirley Clarke’s THE COOL WORLD on a restore 35mm print, which was excellent.
I also saw BURNING, for which I struggle to understand the enthusiasm. An enormous step down from the great SECRET SUNSHINE and the incredible POETRY. Biggest letdown of the year. So boring.
I saw Bohemian and my regular movie theatre was even more packed than on the opening weekend. No one walked during the final credits which is a miracle.
I saw Honoré's Sorry Angel, and really loved it. I hope you get to see it, Nathaniel. A smart, colorful, ultra French queer flick about how else people were behaving at the same time as BPM.
Finally caught up with AUDRIE AND DAISY on Netflix. Sickening.
Finished NO OFFENCE, entertaining British cop show by Paul Abbott, with some great lead female performances.
Started both HOMECOMING and CAMPING. Both have promise beyond the first episodes. Nice to see Julia Roberts on my TV.
Caught up with "Won't you be my neighbor?" and it's sweet, but paints Fred Rogers as essentially unknowable. I think the biggest challenge Marielle Heller has with the upcoming biopic will be granting him any kind of interiority, because everyone talks about him in terms of his public face and his mission. (I'm not even implying that he's less than genuine, just that it's hard to get a real sense of his process, his relationships, etc.)
I'm surprised that "Spider's Web" did so poorly - I didn't see it or particularly care, but I just assumed that others would.
Why is there a picture of The Cloverfield Paradox in the box for Overlord?
I didn't get to Suspiria during the week like I planned and it was already out of every local theater it was playing at last weekend on Friday. One of these theaters sold out the entire opening weekend and the nighttime showings during the week. The release schedule makes no sense
This was the first weekend I skipped going to the theater in about two months. Instead I mainlined my FilmStruck watchlist (*sobs*).
The best things I watched were Cluny Brown and La Ceremonie, which I've been wanting to see for years, but has been unavailable to me (where will we access these films when FilmStruck is gone?). Cluny Brown is late Lubitsch film starring Jennifer Jones; it's sweet and funny and probably my favorite Jones performance. La Ceremonie is terrific at telegraphing dread, and it made me want to see more of Chabrol's work.
Watched Can You Ever Forgive Me. Easily going to be in my top ten for the year. I'm in awe of McCarthy's performance. The chemistry between her and Grant as well as her and Curtin (in such few, short scenes even!) was masterful. I wish CYEFM was more central in the discussion for Best Picture and Best Director. Deserving - seems like it will hold up well over time.
Also saw Bohemian Rhapsody. Good... Malek is good... suspect it won't stick with me.
Caught up to Moana (what 2 years late?).
And that picture for Free Solo above looks just like an image from Black Narcissus! Am I late to this discussion? Was it purposeful?
Suzanne --
Kanopy is a more than adequate substitute for Filmstruck.
Saw the grinch which I felt was better than the 2000 Jim Carrey version, bohemian rhapsody for a third time. This week I’m seeing overlord, nutcracker and the girl in the spiders web so I could see fantastic beasts 2 and green book a few times over the thanksgiving weekend and pre thanksgiving weekend
Alfred - Kanopy is only a substitute for FilmStruck if you live in a location where your library offers it. Most people do not.
Suzanne--I adore Cluny Brown. Jones and Boyer make a sublime romantic pairing. Who knew plumbing could be so sexy LOL.
Yeah, I just checked and I don't have access to Kanopy, so it's not an option for me either. As a result, I saw Wildlife, but spent most of the weekend with FilmStruck, catching Victim & Madeleine, the latter of which is awesome and I don't get why more people haven't obsessed over this.
I saw Roma and Happy as Lazzaro at AFI Fest. Roma is a lovely, deeply felt personal epic. I hope it doesn’t become a victim of all the hype. It’s scope is small and intimate, which may be a surprise for anyone who has read some of the hossanas that make it sound like a world-altering epic. It’s focus is personal and it immersed the viewer in the time, milieu and the life of a particular family. Like any great film, it’s effects linger long after you see it. It’s a powerful and humane film.
Happy as Lazzaro was also good, but does meander especially in the second half. It’s an observant commentary on progress. It’s a parable on modern life anchored by the enigmatic Lazzaro, our modern day Lazarus, who even in his rural community is a bit of an odd duck. Happy as Lazzaro is moving in surprising ways and quite funny at times. The magic realism works here, unmooring the viewer just as Lazzaro’s community is unmoored from the life they knew.
I carved a big chunk out towards my goal of 365 movies in a calendar year.
British Film Festival last weekend here - I saw KING OF THIEVES, THE HAPPY PRINCE, THE KNACK... AND HOW TO GET IT, PETERLOO, SWIMMING WITH MEN and INTERLUDE IN PRAGUE. SWIMMING and INTERLUDE were awful, and whilst I didn't mind PETERLOO, it wasn't Leigh's best - I don't think he's the type to do a disaster movie (which this essentially is/should be).
Jewish Film Festival - saw STUDIO 54 and SOBIBOR. Gawd, did the Russian film overplay the holocaust misery porn card! (Apologies to those affected by the Holocaust, but there is a right way and a wrong way to depict the horror.)
BOY ERASED - so wonderful. Russell Crowe and Nicole Kidman are bad people, because they both made me cry!
SHIRKERS (on Netflix) - interesting personal gonzo-like documentary
I've been attending the AFI Film Fest and been seeing some great movies. So far I've seen Olivier Assayas' "Non Fiction", "Knife+Heart", "Ray & Liz", "Happy as Lazzaro", the 70's inspired horror flick, "In Fabric" and my favorite so far, "Her Smell' was an absolutely fantastic performance by Elizabeth Moss. I'm check out "Under The Silverlake" tonight.
so, Rosemund Pike. 85% on Rotten Tomatoes. She's not even in your longshots. Do you think she will sneak in?
I live in an urban area but still over 75 percent of movies are primarily for kids, teenagers and garbage eaters.
I saw BEAUTIFUL BOY. It's got fine performances, but otherwise it could have been a TV Movie. At least a third of the movie is people staring off into the middle distance. I'm not a parent, so YMMV, but this story is a sad and tragic, but not unique, story
I don't really look at numbers or anything, I just go to what looks good to me personally
I saw "Halloween" which is scary good- they wisely ignored all the sequels and those horrible Rob Zombie remakes. Jamie Lee Curtis is excellent as the survivor who knows the nightmare will not end until the Shape is dead