| Date | |
|---|---|
| Author | Tom Linay |
The Weekend Round-up
- Our Faith in Last Christmas was rewarded as it finally knocked Joker from the top spot with £2.7m. Recent comparisons are not obvious due to the lack of big Christmas romantic comedies this decade, but earlier this year a romantic comedy launched featuring the music of a legendary 20th century recording artist or band and Yesterday kicked off its run with £2.1m on its way to £13.8m. It held up strongly week-to-week and with Christmas still five weeks away, hopefully Last Christmas will too.
- Le Mans ’66 opened in second with £2m, which includes £88k from previews. The last big motor racing drama, Rush, opened with £2.1m in 2013 and finished its run on £10.1m, so hopefully Le Mans ’66 can stay the course similarly.
- Joker, in its seventh week, was finally knocked off the top of the box office but still added another £1m which takes its total to £56.1m. This week it will overtake The Dark Knight Rises (£56.3m) to become DC Comics’ biggest box office hit ever in the UK.
- Maleficent: Mistress Of Evil added another £691m, a drop of 33%, which was enough for fourth. That takes its total to £14m and it’s now the second biggest live-action film that Angelina Jolie has starred in, behind only Maleficent (£19.5m), having just overtaken Mr. And Mrs. Smith (£13.6m).
- The Addams Family completed the top five, falling 36% to £647k. That takes its total to £9.1m and it’s now the fifth biggest animated film of 2019.
- Outside of the top five, Terminator: Dark Fate has crossed the £7m mark tenth and now sits on £7.1m.
Overall the box office is down 2% from last weekend and down 59% from the same weekend last year when the top films were Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes Of Grindelwald, The Grinch,Bohemian Rhapsody and Widows.
The Buzz
Just Mercy is a moving drama that tells the true story of Walter McMillian (Jamie Foxx), who with the help of young defence attorney Bryan Stevenson (Michael B. Jordan) appeals his murder conviction. It has already played at both the Toronto and London Film Festivals and has received strong reviews. Variety said (director) ‘Destin Daniel Cretton ... finds a newly supple way to deliver a liberal Hollywood knockout punch.’ Screen International’s review was also positive, calling it a ‘forceful reckoning of a broken legal system’. DCM’s Samantha Butters saw it at the London Film Festival and she said she ‘bawled her eyes out’. It’s in UK cinemas on 17 January.
Across The Pond
Ford V Ferrari (or Le Mans ’66 as it’s known in the UK) topped the box office podium in the US, opening with an impressive $31m. Midway fell to second, dropping 51% to $8.8m for a new total of $35.1m. Charlie's Angels disappointed, opening in third with $8.6m, which is well short of the mid-teens debut that was expected. Playing with Fire came in fourth, falling 33% to $8.6m and it has now banked $25.4m. Last Christmas completed the top five, adding $6.7m for a new total of $22.6m.