“Abominable” Tops With Unspectacular Opening

By: Keaton Marcus

Diving into the weekend, Universal’s newest film, Abominable grabbed the top spot in the box office, delivering just ahead of expectations, and receiving positive reviews, despite not being huge. The last spots were wholly taken by holdovers, with Downton Abbey sliding quite a bit to second place, while Hustlers and It: Chapter Two held excellently, otherwise, Ad Astra rounded out the top five, continuing its disappointingly average performance.

Taking some more yeti success was Universal’s animated film Abominable, which sold an estimated 20.8M in tickets—this is a tad ahead of the 17-20M pre-weekend expectations. Available in 4,242 sites across North America, the 75M production averaged a so-so $4,915 per-screen. While it remains behind both Smallfoot (23M) and 2016’s Storks (21.3M), it is just ahead of The LEGO Ninjago Movie (20.4M) and it crushes Wonder Park (15.8M). For the finish, if we look at the multiplier for the four films above, we get an average of about 3.2x—which translates to a 66M prediction, but considering the excellent audience reception, we might be looking more at a 75M close.

After opening in only a few markets last week, this weekend, the movie expanded to 30 material markets, where it hauled in an estimated 8.8M, for a foreign gross of 10.2M and a global total of 31M. Leading the way was a 1.98M debut in Mexico, followed by Brazil (1.45M). Reversing back to the 75M price tag, the picture still needs to earn more than around 160-170M+ to actually break even. With many markets yet to be released, next weekend sees openings in both Italy and Russia.

Review wise, Abominable received generally positive reception from the critics, while the audiences thought the film was nearly flawless. On RottenTomatoes, based on 90 reviews, it holds a weighted average of 80% “Certified Fresh”, while Metacritic gives it a 62/100 based on 25 top critics. Opening day audiences handed the family family feature an almost perfect 96% on RT, as well as an A CinemaScore.

In runner-up was last weekend’s focal point, Focus Features’ Downton Abbey, which took quite a dip of 53.3% from its excellent opening weekend. This results in a sophomore session of 14.5M, which adds to North American sales tallying to 58.8M after 10 days in release. To keep in mind, the TV adaptation is pacing closely to 2017’s The Mummy, which finished with 80.2M domestically—which is abnormal, considering its positive critical reception, and excellent audience feedback. Overseas, the picture added an estimated 10M internationally, for a foreign total of 48.6M and a worldwide bout of 107.1M.

Third held the real winner for the weekend, with another wonderful hold from STX Entertainment’s Hustlers which dropped just 31.8% for a third Fri-Sun bout of 11.4M, which counts to it’s impressive, 80.6M from just 17 days of theatrical release. Now ranking third in the all-time of STX (topping A Bad Mom’s Christmas’ 72.1M), the stripper drama will likely challenge The Upside (108.2M) for runner-up, and perhaps Bad Moms (113.2M) for the crown. Additionally, the 20 million production added an estimated 3M overseas, for an international gross of 14.8M and a worldwide total of 95.4M.

Staying in fourth position was Warner Bros.’ horror follow-up It: Chapter Two, which also made some solid numbers, sliding 38.8% for a fourth weekend of 10.4M. The United States and Canada show that the Stephen King adaptation has generated 193.9M as it closes in on the 200 million milestone. But how far can the film go over that mark? Considering the most recent weekend drop, we are considering a domestic close of 225M. Overseas, the film hauled in 11M, for an international running gross of 223.5M and a global wrap of 417.4M.

Rounding out the top five was Fox’s big-budget thriller-drama hybrid Ad Astra, which continued its comfortably average performance with an estimated 10.1M, producing a decent drop of 46.6% and tallying 35.5M domestically after 10 days. Really, Fox has not had much luck this year, with their biggest film being Alita: Battle Angel (85.7M), and they have struggled a lot with expensive productions such as the film mentioned before, the picture given and Dark Phoenix, which grossed only 252.4M worldwide on a budget of 200M. Furthermore, the picture added another 18M overseas, and has now made just 89M globally on a cost of 100M.

Next weekend, we see one new, nationwide arrival heading to blow up the top spot. With WB’s Joker around the bend, we wouldn’t be surprised to see a new October opening record, expecting a debut of around 80-90M from an estimated 4,000 locations.

TOP FIVE:

Abominable
Downton Abbey
Hustlers
It Chapter Two
Ad Astra