Weekend Estimates: Healthy Arrivals Help Veterans Day Box Office

November 13, 2016

Doctor Strange

While Doctor Strange and Trolls aren’t really being threatened at the top of the chart this weekend, a few healthy new releases are giving Veterans Day weekend a timely boost at the box office. Arrival is the stand-out performer in wide release, with $24 million from 2,317 theaters and an average over $10,000. The sci-fi drama is a critical darling, but is having a harder time with general audiences who might be expecting something with a few more explosions and laser battles, and its CinemaScore is a B. Its potential long-term performance is a therefore a little hard to gauge at this point, but it would be very surprising for it not to pick up a few more theaters, and it might be decent counter-programming to the explosions and laser battles promised by several other films coming up in the next few weeks.

The other new wide release doing well is Almost Christmas, with Universal projecting a weekend around $15.6 million from 2,376 theaters for the family comedy. It seems like a film that could play well through Thanksgiving, and its A- CinemaScore won’t do any harm in that respect.

The two films at the top of the chart were both given nice bumps by Veterans Day, and the market as a whole was probably helped by the end of election season, with a little less to distract audiences from going to the movies. Doctor Strange will be down just 49% to $43 million and will have $153 million in the bank domestically by the end of Sunday, per Disney. That will give the studio its best year ever at the domestic box office, even before Rogue One comes out in December. Strange will pick up another $60.2 million overseas this weekend for a total of $339.6 million abroad and $492.6 million globally to date. The film has made $83.5 million in China so far, $37.1 million in Korea, and $24.2 million in the United Kingdom.

In second place, Trolls will be down just 25% this weekend, to $35 million. It has picked up $94 million so far domestically.

This weekend’s disappointing wide release is Shut In, which EuropaCorp has pegged at making just $3.7 million from 2,058 theaters, for an average below $2,000 per theater.

In limited release, we have an abundance of riches this weekend. Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk sets out with $120,000 from two theaters ahead of expanding wide next weekend. Elle is making a great start with $56,000 expected from two locations. Loving will pick up $532,000 from 46 theaters in its second weekend and is still average over $10,000 per theater. Moonlight is just falling short of the top 10 again this weekend (it was 11th last weekend, and 12th this), but will increase 10% in total to $1.36 million from 176 movie houses and has $4.8 million so far. Also worth mentioning is The Eagle Huntress, which is now among the top 20 documentaries of the year after two weekends in theaters.

- Weekend estimates

- Arrival comparison chart
- Almost Christmas comparison chart
- Shut In comparison chart
- Doctor Strange comparison chart
- Marvel Cinematic Universe at the box office
- Trolls comparison chart
- Hacksaw Ridge comparison chart

Bruce Nash,

Filed under: Weekend Estimates, Trolls, Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk, Doctor Strange, Shut In, Arrival, Almost Christmas, Loving, Moonlight, Elle, The Eagle Huntress, Marvel Cinematic Universe