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| Author | DCM |
The Weekend Round-up
- 1917 held the box office in its second weekend, proving it’s not just a one-shot wonder; the film dropped just 16% to add £6.1m. The film’s current £18.4m total is already bigger than the lifetime totals of all of 2019’s awards contenders, the biggest of these being The Favourite’s £16.9m. The next target to beat is Darkest Hour’s total of £24.1m.
- Bad Boys For Life opened in second place with £2.7m, which is just down from Bad Boys II’s opening total of £3.1m in 2003. Since that film’s opening, Will Smith has starred in 16 live-action films with an average opening weekend of £3.6m, with the new film sitting between Men in Black 3 (£2.9m) and The Pursuit Of Happyness (£2.5). Martin Lawrence’s biggest opener was the iconic, award-winning Big Momma's House 2 (£1.7m) in 2006.
- Little Women is at No.3 with another strong hold in its fourth weekend – down just 27%. It added £1.4m for a total to date of £16.3m, likely down to a short boost after the Oscars nominations and also due to it being the greatest film ever made.
- The Gentlemen keeps a hold on fourth place in its third weekend, and has now passed £7.8m. Guy Ritchie’s last film Aladdin finished on £37m, a total The Gentlemen is unlikely to beat, however last year’s effort did have the nostalgic marketing power of Disney behind it.
- Jumanji: The Next Level completed the top five with a steady £1m, taking its total to £32m. The title is looking to finish below Welcome to the Jungle’s final total of £38.5m, but only just.
- Outside of the top five, Bombshell hasn’t quite had the impact that its title would suggest, opening with a 3-day gross of £686k, rising to £736k if Tuesday previews are included. Just Mercy opened in ninth place with £527k, including previews.
The overall box office is down 3% from last weekend, but up 22% versus the same weekend in 2019 when Glass and Mary Queen Of Scots opened with £3.3m and £2.0m respectively.
Next Weekend
- The Personal History of David Copperfield is Armando Iannucci’s (The Death of Stalin, Veep) eccentric spin on the Charles Dickens classics, starring Dev Patel in the titular role.
- The Grudge is a Sam Raimi-produced reboot of the horror classic. A house is cursed by a vengeful ghost that dooms those who enter it with a violent death.
- The Turning stars Finn Wolfhard and Mackenzie Davis in a modern take on Henry James’ novella The Turn of the Screw. A young governess is hired by a man who has become responsible for his young nephew and niece after the deaths of their parents.
The Buzz
Parasite continued its fantastic awards season run last night at the Screen Actors Guild (SAG) Awards, becoming the first foreign-language film to win the Best Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture award, which is considered the top prize. This ramps up Parasite’s chances at next month’s Oscars, where it’s vying for both Best Foreign Language Film and Best Picture, and is hoping to be the first South Korean film to win the latter. DCM’s Michael Tull has described the film as “Real crowd-pleaser that’s full of thrilling twists and humour – my favourite of the awards season contenders this year”. Parasite is released in UK cinemas on 7 February.
Across The Pond
Bad Boys For Life topped the box office across the pond with a strong opening $59, closely followed by the ominous Dolittle’s opening haul of $22.5m. 1917 dropped down to third place in its fourth week, and now has a running total of $77m. Jumanji: The Next Level continues to produce solid numbers on a weekly basis, adding another $9.6m to its running total. Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker completed the top five over the weekend, and has now grossed $492m.