Warner’s San Andreas demolished expectations in a big way this weekend with a first place start of $54.59 million. The Dwayne Johnson led disaster film proved to be critic proof this weekend and no doubt received an added boost from Johnson’s growing fanbase after the recent break-out success of Furious 7. The opening weekend performance of San Andreas was especially impressive when considering the relatively low levels of online buzz the film displayed in the weeks leading up to its release. In addition to outpacing expectations in a big way, San Andreas opened 83 percent stronger than the $29.80 million start of last year’s Hercules and just 18 percent below the $66.41 million opening of 2013’s World War Z.
San Andreas opened with $18.15 million on Friday (which included an estimated $3.1 million from Thursday evening shows), increased a surprisingly strong 13 percent on Saturday to take in $20.51 million and declined just 22 percent on Sunday to gross $15.93 million. That placed the film’s opening weekend to Friday ratio at 3.01 to 1. That is a very encouraging early sign going forward, as is the film’s A- rating on CinemaScore (which suggests that the film is going over much better with moviegoers than with critics). However, competition will be especially fierce throughout the month of June, especially from Universal’sJurassic World.
The audience breakdown for San Andreas was nearly evenly split between genders (51 percent female, 49 percent male) and skewed heavily towards moviegoers over the age of 25 (70 percent).
Pitch Perfect 2 placed in a distant second this weekend with $14.82 million. Universal’s successful musical comedy sequel starring Anna Kendrick was down a sharp 52 percent from last weekend’s three-day frame. While Pitch Perfect 2 continues to be quite front-loaded, the film is still outpacing expectations in a big way with a 17-day take of $147.52 million. That places the film 30 percent ahead of the $113.70 million 17-day take of last year’s Neighbors. Pitch Perfect 2 could experience another sizable decline next weekend with both Fox’s Spy and Focus’s Insidious: Chapter 3 entering the marketplace.
On the heels of last weekend’s already lackluster start, Disney’s Tomorrowland was down two spots and a troubling 57 percent this weekend to place in third with $14.30 million. Mixed word of mouth and the break-out performance of San Andreas both clearly took a toll on Tomorrowland this weekend. The pricy Brad Bird directed sci-fi film starring George Clooney has grossed $63.69 million in ten days of release. Tomorrowlandis currently running 13 percent behind the $73.10 million ten-day start of 2011’s Super 8 and will need to stabilize very soon if it is to eventually reach the $100 million domestic mark.
Warner’s Mad Max: Fury Road followed closely behind in fourth with $14.18 million. The critically acclaimed action film starring Tom Hardy and Charlize Theron was down 42 percent, which represented a solid hold given the added presence of San Andreas this weekend. Mad Max: Fury Road continues to perform on the high end of expectations with a 17-day take of $116.47 million. That places the film 7 percent ahead of the $108.45 million 17-day gross of 2012’s Prometheus.
Avengers: Age of Ultron rounded out the weekend’s top five with $11.40 million. The blockbuster superhero sequel from Disney and Marvel fell 47 percent from last weekend. Avengers: Age of Ultron has grossed $427.55 million through 31 days of release. The film surpassed the $424.67 million final gross of 2013’s The Hunger Games: Catching Fire this weekend to move into tenth place on the all-time unadjusted domestic chart.
Meanwhile, Sony’s Aloha was off to a very soft start this weekend with a sixth place take of just $9.67 million. The Cameron Crowe directed film starring Bradley Cooper, Emma Stone and Rachel McAdams opened below its already scaled back expectations. Unlike San Andreas, which was able to use Johnson’s recent success with Furious 7 to its advantage, Aloha was unable to see any type of boost from Cooper’s recent success with American Sniper. The one saving grace for Aloha is that the film carried a modest reported production budget of $37 million. Aloha opened 14 percent below the $11.24 million three-day start of 2009’s All About Steve.
Aloha started out with $3.49 million on Friday (which included an estimated $0.50 million from Thursday evening shows), increased 6 percent on Saturday to take in $3.69 million and declined 32.5 percent on Sunday to gross $2.49 million. That gave the film an opening weekend to Friday ratio at 2.77 to 1. While a number of Crowe’s previous efforts have been able to display very strong holding power, Aloha will have an uphill battle ahead of it given a soft B- rating on CinemaScore, poor critical reviews and the amount of competition it will face throughout June. The audience breakdown for the film skewed towards female moviegoers (64 percent) and towards moviegoers over the age of 30 (57 percent).
Fox’s Poltergeist placed in seventh this weekend with $8.06 million. The PG-13 horror remake was down a very sharp 64 percent from last weekend. Poltergeist has grossed $38.53 million in ten days. That is towards the lower end of pre-release expectations and places the film 7 percent behind the $41.53 million ten-day take of 2013’s Evil Dead.
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