Mockingjay insults the rest of the chart, Penguins of Madagascar smile and wave goodbye to a lot of money, nobody particularly like Horrible Bosses now, and Other Box Office News.
This past weekend, Americans were witness to a dystopian future. One with barely restrained tensions, majorly unfair financial differences, and a complete lack of fairness and generosity. These disparate groups would congregate under one roof to try and make it through proceedings in a civilised fashion, until one side insulted Peeta at which point all bets were off. Proceedings were violent, conflicts escalated, both sides exited wondering who had really won that round, filled with feelings of unsatisfaction, like the resolution had been postponed for another year or something. But enough about Thanksgiving with your family. At the box office, much like my joke construction, The Hunger Games repeated its Thanksgiving first place status to diminishing returns with Mockingjay, Part 1 taking home $56 million this year. Expect history to repeat itself next year and for me to basically copy-paste this dreadfully unfunny paragraph again in the hopes that you won’t notice.
It’s not like Mockingjay, Part 1 had much in the way of competition, though. Continuing an absolutely dismal year for DreamWorks Animation, Penguins of Madagascar decidedly underwhelmed in its opening weekend. Even with the five-day Thanksgiving bump, it could only manage $36 million. Without it, that’s $25 million over the weekend which, for a spin-off of one of the few remaining cash-cows that DreamWorks has and as promoted to hell and back as this film has been, is dismal. The one saving grace for the film is that Annie and Night at the Museum 3 aren’t out for another 3 weeks, so there’s still a chance that it can make up some of that cash before it gets dogpiled. I’m sorry, you were expecting snark? Nope, no snark here, this news genuinely bums me out and has me majorly worried considering the position DreamWorks is in right now.
Still, could be worse. You could be Horrible Bosses 2. Yes, the widely-trashed comedy sequel that quite literally nobody was ever asking for didn’t do so hot. Over the five-day weekend, it barely reached $23 million and over three days it could only make $15.7 million for fifth place. Yeah, safe to say we are all being spared from Horrible Bosses 3: The Final Chapter, Part 1. What we are unfortunately not being spared from, however, is The Theory of Everything which went nationwide this past weekend and managed to bank $5 million from 800-odd screens. If Eddie Redmayne takes the Best Actor Oscar from Dan Stevens in The Guest (or Jake Gyllenhaal in Nightcrawler), then tables will be flipped. Just warning you Academy; you don’t want no part of this shit.
In more limited release news, The Imitation Game finally reached American shores this weekend and the typical Weinstein push ensured a very solid opening. $482,000 from 4 screens for a per-screen average of $120,500, putting it only behind The Grand Budapest Hotel in Best Limited Release Openings of 2014, is most definitely more than “very solid”. One can only imagine how the latter film would have done if it had a legion of Benedict Cumberbatch fangirls and fanboys filling the back rows with their… Yeah, OK, I’m just going to move on. Foxcatcher added another 48 theatres to its run and broke past $1 million, meaning we should see it in the Top 10 soon enough. The Babadook, meanwhile, finally got a release in America and it did OK: $27,000 from 3 theatres for a per-screen average of You Do The Math. In other words, it’s The Guest all over again. Goddammit.
This Full List is gonna take ya riiii-ght in-to the DANGER ZONE!!
Box Office Results: Friday 28th November 2014 – Sunday 30th November 2014
1] The Hunger Games: Mockingjay, Part 1
$56,875,000 / $225,693,000
Have you heard the CHVRCHES track from the Mockingjay, Part 1 soundtrack, yet? If not, go do so immediately! It is SO GOOD! Like, “this could’ve gone on their debut album” good, and The Bones of What You Believe is a bloody damn good album! In fact, from what I’ve experienced of the soundtracks to all three films so far, everybody brings their A-game when they’re called upon for a track. Nobody coasts. I love that about them. Think it’s time I took the plunge and bought the lot.
2] Penguins of Madagascar
$25,800,000 / $36,000,000 / NEW
Friday. It’s out here Friday, I am seeing it first thing Friday, I will not go to bed that day until there is a review ready to run on Saturday. I’m genuinely really excited for this. In the meanwhile, the DreamWorks Retrospective archive is here. Go amuse yourself and make me feel like I haven’t wasted 5 months of my life.
3] Big Hero 6
$18,770,000 / $167,209,000
Only a 7% drop between weekends, which is pretty darn astou-WHY IS THIS MOVIE NOT IN FRONT OF MY EYEBALLS RIGHT NOW?!! IT’S NOT FAIR!! (*proceeds to have a mini-breakdown*)
4] Interstellar
$15,800,000 / $147,090,000
I would really like to go and see this again on the big screen for a second try, especially since I’m still not 100% solid on my opinions on it. However, six films are coming out this week in the UK and I have way too much work to do to find time to see it again. Plus, I have to give up a good 15 hours of my life to The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit in the next 11 days. I genuinely don’t have the time.
5] Horrible Bosses 2
$15,700,000 / $23,010,000 / NEW
Saw it on Friday and I’ll see if I can find time to get a review out – I’m currently working on one for Paddington in between essay work, DreamWorks work, other articles, and social commitments so this will more than likely fall by the wayside – but the skinny is this: I laughed a good consistent amount, but it is still an utterly pointless sequel and it drops the ball and crosses the line on the Julia stuff spectacularly. Think of it as the American equivalent of The Inbetweeners 2 and you’re about there. If you have nothing better to do or just want to get some easy laughs for 100-odd minutes, this is fine but it’s still ultimately pointless.
6] Dumb and Dumber To
$8,295,000 / $72,205,000
So… Jim Carrey’s not making a full-on box office comeback, is he? (*dejected sigh*)
7] The Theory of Everything
$5,082,000 / $9,604,000
Still refuse to believe that this is anything other than dreadfully mediocre slop. Still can’t be proven right or wrong until New Year’s Day. Still going to bitch and moan about its existence until then.
8] Gone Girl
$2,470,000 / $160,557,000
I was going to say that we must bid adieu to Gone Girl, but then I looked at the release schedule for next week and saw that nothing at all is coming out. Wild is only in 5 theatres, and The Pyramid is being sent to die on 550 screens, like Fox have been reading the signs with regards to Horror films at the box office this past year or something. So, we’ve got one more week before this inexplicably long-lasting flick finally drops out. Seriously, I love this film to death and I have absolutely no idea how it has managed to make over $330 million worldwide.
9] Birdman
$1,880,000 / $17,237,400
10] St. Vincent
$1,773,000 / $39,327,000
So maybe it won’t have the courtesy to stick around for its UK release after all. That sounds very much like Bill Murray. Always leaving the parties that he crashes before I have the chance to book the plane ticket to take me there! That prankster! Of course, this joke only works if I actually went to parties and nobody ever invites me to theirs because I’m… I’m… (*breaks down sobbing*)
Dropped Out: Beyond the Lights, Fury
Callie Petch will hold up to an idea.
Callie Petch 