Weekend Predictions: Civil War will Win Weekend, but will New Releases Earn any Money?

May 12, 2016

Money Monster

There's not much mystery over what movie will come out on top of the box office this weekend. Captain America: Civil War will repeat as champion, as neither Money Monster nor The Darkness are expected to be box office hits. In fact, both of them combined will earn less in total than Civil War will make over the weekend. Unfortunately, this weekend last year had a one-two punch with Pitch Perfect 2 and Mad Max: Fury Road. Civil War will beat those two individually, but 2015's depth is going to be really hard to top. Fortunately, 2016 has such a lead so far that it can weather this storm.

Captain America: Civil War earned the best opening of 2016, even though it failed to live up to the hype. The Fanboy Effect will take its toil this weekend, but its reviews will help mitigate its decline. On the high end, it will fall just over 50% earning close to $90 million over the weekend. On the low end, it will fall just over 60% to $70 million during its sophomore stint. If we split the difference, we get close to $80 million over the weekend for a ten-day running tally of over $300 million. It won't be the only film to reach the $300 million milestone this weekend.

The Jungle Book should remain in second place with $15 million to $16 million pushing it over $300 million in total. The next question is, will it top Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice in the end? I'm going with yes.

Money Monster is the bigger of the two wide releases this week. The film stars George Clooney and Julia Roberts, both of whom had previous releases this year. This film isn't as good as Hail, Caesar! was, but hopefully its going to be a bigger hit than Mother's Day. Its early reviews are good, but not great, while the buzz is merely okay. I'm a little more bullish than most and I think it will only make $12 million over the weekend. Hopefully it will have good legs in the counter-programming role.

Mother's Day got a boost last weekend from the actual Mother's Day, but thanks to its reviews, it will collapse this weekend. Look for just under $5 million over the weekend. This is still a better result than most were expecting.

Finally there is The Darkness, a horror film opening in less than 2,000 theaters and with no reviews on Rotten Tomatoes. None of that is good news for The Darkness. Horror movies are rarely breakout hits, although there are the rare exceptions. Opening in less than 2,000 theaters is also a bad sign, as it shows the distributor, or the theater owners, or both don't have a lot of faith in the film. Finally, lack of reviews are never a good sign. Add in the quiet buzz and the movie will likely only pull in $4 million over the weekend. It will avoid the Mendoza Line ($2,000/theater), but not by a lot. And if it doesn't meet these low expectations, then Zootopia will be there to grab fifth place.

- Money Monster Comparisons
- The Boy Comparisons
- The Jungle Book vs. Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice

Filed under: Weekend Preview, Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, The Jungle Book, Captain America: Civil War, Zootopia, The Darkness, Money Monster, Mother’s Day, Julia Roberts, George Clooney