by Conan Simmons – March 22, 2021 – 4:44 am
The Weekend Box Office Top 5 brings a small gain of 4% over last weekend. Animated films continue to dominate as America’s favorite genre. ‘Raya and the Last Dragon’ and ‘Tom and Jerry’ saw small drops at the box office while ‘The Croods: A New Age’ received a small gain as it stays in the Weekend Box Office Top 5 for a glorious 17 weeks!
The dramatic thriller ‘The Courier’ starring Benedict Cumberbatch and Rachel Brosnahan makes its debut at third place, just ahead of the sci-fi flick ‘Chaos Walking’ starring Daisy Ridley and Tom Holland.
Theaters in California are mostly open with limited capacity due to coronavirus safety regulations, much like theaters in New York. Regal Cinemas, the nations second largest theater chain, remain closed as does Arclight Cinemas. They might open next week in time for the expected hit ‘Godzilla vs. Kong’ or they may choose to remain closed for the foreseeable future.
WEEKEND BOX OFFICE TOP 5
- ‘Raya and the Last Dragon’ – $5.2 million – animated (drop $300k, 5% decline)
- ‘Tom and Jerry’ – $3.8 million – animated (drop $300k, 7% decline)
- ‘The Courier’ – $2 million – drama (debut)
- ‘Chaos Walking’ – $1.9 million – sci-fi (drop $300k, 14% decline)
- ‘The Croods: A New Age’ – $620k – animated (gain $100k, 19% increase)
The total for the Weekend Box Office Top 5 comes to $13.5 million. It is a gain of $500k over last weekends $13 million, an increase of 4%.
Curiously the three films that saw drops this weekend all dropped by $300k, a remarkable coincidence.
‘Peter Rabbit 2: The Runaway’ has moved out of its May release date and hopped into a 4th of July weekend release next to ‘Top Gun: Maverick’, signaling a strong return to the theaters this summer. In a similar move, as ‘Fast and Furious 9’ moved into a June 25 release date it caused ‘Venom: Let There Be Carnage’ to vacate that date in favor of a September 17 release.
It’s starting to look like the normal Hollywood shuffling that the studios do to maximize profits as opposed to trying to avoid coronavirus lockdowns that oppressed the industry for the past year.
For you comic book super hero fans, if ‘Zack Snyder’s Justice League’ streaming for 4 hours on HBO Max isn’t placating you, Marvel’s ‘Black Widow’ is still set for May 7 in theaters.