Weekend Estimates: Winter Soldier Beats Out Rio
April 13, 2014
When Friday's numbers came in, the consensus was that Rio 2 would take the weekend, but relatively weak Saturday numbers for the debutant, and strength through the weekend for Captain America: The Winter Soldier, means that the final weekend estimates on Sunday morning point towards a win for Marvel's superheroes. Captain America is projected to earn $41.4 million over three days for a domestic total around $159 million after two weekends. That's well ahead of the original's $117 million at this stage in its release, and the film's worldwide box office will better the first film's final global total by the end of the weekend too. Rio 2, meanwhile, will have an opening weekend almost identical to Rio, which is a slight disappointment, but hardly a disaster.
The weekend's two other new releases will have solid but unspectacular starts. Oculus is projected at around $12 million, which is a happy result for a film that cost only $5 million to make. Draft Day's $9.75 million is more of an issue though. Not only does the Kevin Costner/Jennifer Garner drama have a much higher $25 million production budget to contend with, most of the rest of the world doesn't know what Draft Day is, so international prospects will be limited.
Among returning films, several religiously-themed films are getting attention. God's Not Dead will be down 29% in its fourth weekend and has passed $40 million. Noah is fading, with $7.45 million from 3,282 theaters this weekend and just shy of $85 million in total so far. Son of God is off just 2% this weekend but down to $300,000 in total. All three should get a boost from Easter.
In limited release, The Raid 2 expanded to 954 theaters this weekend and will just top $1 million for 11th place. That's an unusually high result for Sony Pictures Classics, but a theater average of $1,063 suggests it won't stick around for long. The same distributor's Only Lovers Left Alive is performing much more impressively, with $96,976 projected for the weekend from just four theaters. It will be the top performer on a per theater basis this weekend ahead of The Railway Man, which is set for around $64,500 from four theaters. Another movie making a move up the chart is Under the Skin, with $309,248 projected from 54 theaters, for a healthy average of $5,700.
Bruce Nash bruce.nash@the-numbers.com
Filed under: Weekend Estimates, Under the Skin, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Noah, Rio 2, Oculus, Son of God, The Railway Man, Only Lovers Left Alive, Draft Day, God’s Not Dead, Serbuan maut 2: Berandal, Kevin Costner, Jennifer Garner