Sony’s ‘Men In Black: International‘ and Warner Bros.’ ‘Shaft‘ battle with the trend of collapsing franchises at the box office in their debut weekend. Both the movies are expected to fall below projected figures for the weekend. ‘Men in Black: International’ captures the top spot with a $10.4M haul on Friday from 4,224 centers, which helped the movie to hit $26M projected gross in its opening week. The actual projected earnings of the movie stand at $30M for Sony and $35-40M for various trade analysts. The ‘X-Men’ spinoff features Chris Hemsworth and Tessa Thompson in the lead roles of Agent H and Agent M. The movie has to improve its performance in overseas centers in order to catch up with the $110M budget. But the movie has only scored a 24% on Rotten Tomatoes score, a B on CinemaScore and a 3/5 on Postrak, reports The Wrap.
On the other hand, New Line’s ‘Shaft’ falls lower than expectations at the box office in its debut weekend. The movie has a projected gross of $18-20M while the actual figures stand at $7.3M mark that collected from 2,952 screens. ‘Shaft’ features Jessie Usher as John “JJ” Shaft Jr., an FBI agent and a cybersecurity expert who teams up with his father (Samuel L. Jackson) in a mission. Richard Roundtree plays the grandfather Shaft in the reboot of ‘Shaft’ movies from the ’70s. The movie has earned a 35% Rotten Tomatoes score and an A CinemaScore.
Universal and Illumination flick ‘The Secret Life of Pets 2‘ ends up in a second place with an estimated $23M in its second week. Though the movie suffered a 51% drop, improving word of mouth is expected to push the Pets further. Disney’s ‘Aladdin‘ still stands strong at the box office with a $250M domestic including a fourth-weekend haul of $17.6M. The movie, which features Will Smith as the Genie, captures the third spot this week.
Fox and Disney suffer one of the biggest blows this year when ‘Dark Phoenix‘ marked the lowest opening weekend in the history of ‘X-Men’ franchise. The movie now stands at an estimated $8.6M second weekend gross. The Sophie Turner starrer is also expected to bear a drop of 74% in the coming days. The movie lands in the fourth spot week. Moreover, ‘Dark Phoneix’ is in a neck-to-neck box office race with Paramount’s ‘Rocketman,’ which holds the fifth spot with an $8.5M in its third weekend.
The Emma Thompson comedy ‘Late Night’ heads for $4.5M from 2,218 centers this week. Jim Jarmusch’s zombie horror comedy ‘The Dead Don’t Die‘ has a modest opening with a $2.5M from 613 locations. With ‘Toy Story 4‘ and ‘Spider-Man: Far From Home‘ set to hit theaters, the first five players will struggle to hold their places in the upcoming week.
Cover Image Courtesy: Sony Pictures