Sony‘s “Bad Boys: Ride or Die” made $21.6M on Friday, on its way to a $53M opening. The fourth instalment in the franchise, currently playing in 3,885 theaters, might actually hit the $55M mark by Sunday evening. Despite Tuesday’s alarming forecast, which had it opening at around $35M, the film’s initial tracking was actually the correct one.
Meanwhile, Warner Bros’ “Furiosa” continues to slide into a box office pit of despair. George Miller’s prequel is down another -60% this weekend with just $4.2M. For a film that benefits from being seen on premium screens, it lost a lot of them in favor of ‘Bad Boys 4.’ This is a total catastrophe for WB, initial numbers had the break-even point at $420M, and now the absolute best-case scenario is $175M worldwide by the end of its run. “Furiosa” is looking at losses of over $200M.
Warner Bros has another major “L” this weekend. Ishana Shyamalan’s “The Watchers,” budgeted at $30M, grossed an estimated $2M domestically on Friday (from 3,351 locations). Terrible reviews certainly did not help. Warner Bros will gladly cancel “Coyote vs Acme” and yet they’re willing to spend money on a film they only greenlit to get Ishana’s father (M. Night) to sign on with them for “Trap.”
Finally, Paramount's “IF” grossed an estimated $2.3M on Friday (from 3,582 locations), which was a 20% decrease from the previous Friday. It should hit $100M domestically by next week, not bad, this one has legs, but that $110M budget sticks out like a sore thumb.
Criterion's December lineup has some great additions to the library, but the title that jumped out at me is Werner Herzog's "Grizzly Man," which officially joins the Collection on December 8.