Copyright Deadline
In a very weak box office weekend with Halloween festivities stealing audiences away today, Universal/Blumhouse’s Black Phone 2 will pop back up to No. 1 in its third frame with a $7.6M take, -41% from last weekend for a running cume of $61M. As we told you the last time Halloween fell on a Friday was 2014, and a Universal/Blumhouse horror movie ruled then, the second weekend of Ouija with $10.7M. That title led Halloween Friday with a $3.4M take, and then popped on Saturday by +47% with $5M. So, goes the hope for all distributors that business on Saturday comes roaring back, but it’s not expected to be anything to brag about. The midday charts show a toss-up for the overall weekend right now for No. 2 between Paramount’s feature take of Colleen Hoover’s Regretting You and Sony/Crunchyroll’s Chainsaw Man both estimated around $4.8M. For Chainsaw Man, that’s a -73% decline, for a running cume that’s at $29.5M. For Regretting You that reps a -65% decline from its $13.68M opening for a running cume of $24.1M. However, Netflix’s second go-round of Kpop Demon Hunters could upset them both with a $5M+ take, that number not made official in midday forecasts. While the movie posted a $19M 2-day No. 1 take back in August in a wide release sans No. 1 chain AMC Theatres, this time around the Leawood, KS based circuit will be playing the Sony anime production along with Regal and Cinemark. Focus Features’ wide break of Yorgos Lanthimos’ fifth collaboration with Emma Stone, Bugonia, is eyeing a $4M second weekend after jumping from 17 theaters in NY/LA/Austin last weekend to 2,043. That’s the biggest wide weekend ever for the Greek Oscar winning filmmaker, his previous high being the eighth weekend of Poor Things which cleared $2.9M. The pic’s second Friday of $1.7M includes $700K in previews from 1,700 theaters. Note that preview figure is ahead of Conclave‘s Thursday previews of $500K a year ago; that pic posting a $6.6M opening at 1,753 theaters, and it’s not far from Phoenician Scheme‘s wide break Thursday previews of $850K from this past summer; that Wes Anderson title’s wide weekend (in its second frame) posting $6.27M at 1,678. There is hope for the long haul on Bugonia based on its 87% with critics and 89% with audiences on Rotten Tomatoes. Lanthimos’ Oscar winning Poor Things was 92% certified fresh with critics and 80% with audiences, while his other Academy Award winning The Favourite was 93% certified fresh and 71% with audiences. Universal’s re-release of Back to the Future at 2,290, with the boost of Imax, is looking at a Friday of $1.55M, which includes $650K previews from last night, for what’s shaping up to be a $3.8M 3-day. This is the 40th anniversary reissue of the Robert Zemeckis directed blockbuster. By comparison, Uni’s re-release of Jaws for its 50th anni posted a 3-day of $8.2M over Labor Day weekend. Disney is hoping for a $4M+ second weekend on Springsteen: Deliver Me From Nowhere, but rivals see it lower. At that level, it’s -55% decline with a $16.4M running cume by EOD Sunday. After making $1.55M with the reissue of 2008’s Twilight, Fathom Entertainment’s re-release of that pic’s 2009 sequel, Twilight Saga: New Moon did $590K at 1,504 theaters last night. Twilight Saga: Eclipse plays today, followed by Breaking Dawn Part 1 on Saturday and Breaking Dawn Part 2 on Sunday. The re-release of the Summit/Lionsgate franchise is in celebration of the novel’s 20th anniversary. .
