Warner Bros.’ thriller The Accountant tallied up the numbers to debut at first place in the box office this weekend with an estimated $24.71 million. The crime thriller starring Ben Affleck as the title character alongside Anna Kendrick and J.K. Simmons was able to maneuver to first place with the lack of serious competition this weekend, despite mixed reviews for the film.
Earning an average “A” CinemaScore from an audience that was 58 percent male and 86 percent over the age of 25, the film debuts 27.0 percent above the $19.45 million opening of fellow Ben Affleck autumn-released thriller Argo in 2012, and 7.5 percent below the $26.7 million inflation-adjusted opening for Affleck’s autumn-released thriller The Town in 2010. The Accountant also starts with more than triple the $7.70 million opening of Affleck’s most recent crime thriller (and notorious box office bomb) Runner Runner.
The Accountant started with an estimated $9.06 million on Friday (including $1.35 million in Thursday evening previews), increased 5.0 percent on Saturday to an estimated $9.52 million, and is projected to decline 35.6 percent on Sunday to $6.12 million. This places its opening weekend to Friday ratio at an estimated 2.72 to 1.
Two films from Universal are in a neck-and-neck race for second place as of early Sunday studio weekend estimates, separated by the miniscule differential of less than $10 thousand — or less than one-hundredth of one percent — difference. Currently, Kevin Hart: What Now? is given the slight edge with $11.984 million while last weekend’s leader The Girl on the Train is at $11.974 million, though the numbers are close enough that the two titles could swap spots by the time weekend actuals are released on Monday.
Which one is more likely to edge out when weekend actuals are released on Monday? Although that’s difficult to ascertain at this point,What Now? may be the more likely bet considering it’s a new release and Train‘s notable 51.1 percent second-weekend decline. (Compare that to the much milder 29.6 percent second-weekend decline of the stylistically-similar Gone Girl.)
What Now?, which showed Hart’s stand-up comedy special in front of 53 thousand fans last year at a Philadelphia football stadium, has Universal publicity calling it the highest debut for a stand-up concert film ever. While that may be true in raw numbers, adjusted for ticket price inflation there are at least three stand-up films to debut higher: 1982’s Richard Pryor: Live on the Sunset Strip with an inflation-adjusted $22.9 million, 1987’s Eddie Murphy Raw with an inflation-adjusted $20.1 million, and 2000’s The Original Kings of Comedy with an inflation-adjusted $17.7 million.
What Now? debuts 8.1 percent above the $11.0 million inflation-adjusted opening of Hart’s previous stand-up film, 2013’s Let Me Explain — although that title debuted on a Wednesday instead of a Friday, resulting in a deflated opening weekend. What Now? starts 2.3 percent behind Explain‘s inflation-adjusted total after its first three days of release — Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday. Earning an A- CinemaScore, What Now? had audience that was 51 percent female, 54 percent over the age of 25, and a hugely lopsided 43 percent African American versus only 24 percent Caucasian.
What Now? started with an estimated $4.76 million on Friday (including $739 thousand in Thursday evening previews), declined 5.0 percent on Saturday to an estimated $4.52 million, and is projected to drop 40.2 percent on Sunday to $2.70 million. This places its opening weekend to Friday ratio at an estimated 2.51 to 1.
Open Road Films’ teenage superhero film Max Steel had one of the lowest debuts of all time with an estimated $2.16 million. That would rank it as the eighth-worst inflation-adjusted opening weekend of all time for a film playing in at least 2,000 theaters nationwide. (Interestingly, four of the seven films below Max Steel on the all time list were released in the past year and a half alone: last month’s Morgan, and last year’s We Are Your Friends, Rock the Kasbah, and Jem and the Holograms.)
Max Steel started with an estimated $637 thousand on Friday (with no Thursday evening preview numbers currently available), increased an estimated 45.0 percent on Saturday to $924 thousand, and is projected to decline 35.0 percent on Sunday to $601 thousand. With an 11th-place debut outside of the top 10 — a very rare occurrence for a national wide release film — expect this title to fall fast and be out of theaters entirely within a few weeks.
The top 10 films this weekend made an estimated $84.65 cumulative total. That’s 9.0 percent below the $93,11 million total earned by the top 10 last weekend, and 22.2 percent below the $108.80 million total from this same weekend last year, when Goosebumps debuted in first place with $23.61 million.
Overseas Update:
Sony’s Inferno launched to a massive estimated $50.0 million overseas weekend in 53 markets, ranking in first place at the box office in 45 of them, ahead of its domestic release later this month. The follow-up thriller to The Da Vinci Code and Angels & Demons starring Tom Hanks started with $5.0 million in Italy (where the film takes place), $4.4 million in Germany, $4.4 million in Russia, $4.0 million in Brazil, $3.8 million in the United Kingdom, $2.6 million in Mexico, and $2.0 million in Spain.
Coming in with less than half that opening weekend was last week’s top overseas film, Fox’s fantasy Miss Peregrine’s Home For Peculiar Children with an estimated $23.4 million overseas weekend, down 44.9 percent. The film has now earned a $130.9 million overseas and $196.8 million global total.
Studio Weekend Estimates for Friday, October 14 – Sunday, October 16, 2016:
| # | TITLE | WEEKEND | LOCATIONS | AVG. | TOTAL | WKS. | DIST. | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | The Accountant | $24,715,000 | — | 3,332 | — | $7,417 | $24,715,000 | 1 | Warner Bros. |
| 2 | Kevin Hart: What Now? | $11,984,245 | — | 2,567 | — | $4,669 | $11,984,245 | 1 | Universal |
| 3 | The Girl on the Train (2016) | $11,974,915 | -51% | 3,241 | 97 | $3,695 | $46,558,510 | 2 | Universal |
| 4 | Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children | $8,900,000 | -41% | 3,835 | 130 | $2,321 | $65,832,789 | 3 | Fox |
| 5 | Deepwater Horizon | $6,350,000 | -45% | 3,403 | 144 | $1,866 | $49,335,332 | 3 | Lionsgate / Summit |
| 6 | Storks | $5,600,000 | -32% | 3,066 | -542 | $1,826 | $59,144,046 | 4 | Warner Bros. |
| 7 | The Magnificent Seven (2016) | $5,200,000 | -42% | 3,210 | -486 | $1,620 | $84,827,562 | 4 | Sony / Columbia |
| 8 | Middle School: The Worst Years of My Life | $4,250,000 | -38% | 2,822 | 0 | $1,506 | $13,760,795 | 2 | CBS Films / Lionsgate |
| 9 | Sully | $2,960,000 | -41% | 2,211 | -847 | $1,339 | $118,371,637 | 6 | Warner Bros. |
| 10 | The Birth of a Nation (2016) | $2,715,000 | -61% | 2,105 | 0 | $1,290 | $12,243,134 | 2 | Fox Searchlight |
| 11 | Max Steel | $2,163,720 | — | 2,034 | — | $1,064 | $2,163,720 | 1 | Open Road |
| 12 | Masterminds (2016) | $1,700,000 | -58% | 2,027 | -1015 | $839 | $16,211,406 | 3 | Relativity Studios |
| 13 | Queen of Katwe | $855,000 | -47% | 1,062 | -197 | $805 | $7,009,424 | 4 | Disney |
| # | TITLE | WEEKEND | LOCATIONS | AVG. | TOTAL | WKS. | DIST. | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Suicide Squad | $720,000 | -36% | 630 | -342 | $1,143 | $323,680,679 | 11 | Warner Bros. |
| 2 | Priceless (2016) | $703,200 | — | 303 | — | $2,321 | $703,200 | 1 | Roadside Attractions |
| 3 | Don’t Breathe | $670,000 | -51% | 612 | -454 | $1,095 | $88,170,186 | 8 | Sony / TriStar |
| 4 | Snowden | $301,102 | -59% | 343 | -444 | $878 | $20,894,069 | 5 | Open Road |
| 5 | Finding Dory | $299,000 | -9% | 189 | -18 | $1,582 | $485,203,581 | 18 | Disney |
| 6 | Blair Witch | $178,000 | -66% | 243 | -425 | $733 | $20,580,516 | 5 | Lionsgate |
| 7 | The Dressmaker | $171,004 | -28% | 146 | -28 | $1,171 | $1,344,727 | 4 | Broad Green Pictures |
| 8 | Hell or High Water | $156,000 | -36% | 188 | -87 | $830 | $26,480,685 | 10 | CBS Films / Lionsgate |
| 9 | American Honey | $142,263 | 83% | 135 | 110 | $1,054 | $362,430 | 3 | A24 |
| 10 | Pete’s Dragon (2016) | $141,000 | -15% | 165 | -59 | $855 | $75,208,453 | 10 | Disney |
| 11 | The Beatles: Eight Days a Week – The Touring Years | $123,887 | -27% | 102 | -18 | $1,215 | $2,598,048 | 5 | Abramorama |
| 12 | Bad Moms | $120,000 | -37% | 176 | -89 | $682 | $113,078,272 | 12 | STX Entertainment |
| 13 | Kubo and the Two Strings | $111,000 | -52% | 139 | -112 | $799 | $47,342,649 | 9 | Focus |
| 14 | Star Trek Beyond | $78,000 | -41% | 151 | -40 | $517 | $158,801,934 | 13 | Paramount |
| 15 | Mechanic: Resurrection | $57,000 | 2% | 101 | 33 | $564 | $21,108,937 | 8 | Lionsgate / Summit |
| # | TITLE | WEEKEND | LOCATIONS | AVG. | TOTAL | WKS. | DIST. | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Desierto | $450,000 | — | 73 | — | $6,164 | $450,000 | 1 | STX Entertainment |
| 2 | Denial | $398,241 | 82% | 96 | 65 | $4,148 | $839,749 | 3 | Bleeker Street |
| 3 | A Man Called Ove | $205,000 | 106% | 78 | 50 | $2,628 | $436,759 | 3 | Music Box Films |
| 4 | No Manches Frida | $110,000 | -46% | 86 | -52 | $1,279 | $11,395,151 | 7 | Lionsgate / Pantelion |
| 5 | M.S. Dhoni: The Untold Story | $80,000 | -72% | 70 | -163 | $1,143 | $1,782,611 | 3 | FIP |
| 6 | Certain Women | $65,230 | — | 5 | — | $13,046 | $65,230 | 1 | |
| 7 | Florence Foster Jenkins | $42,000 | -3% | 87 | 15 | $483 | $27,317,051 | 10 | Paramount |
| 8 | I Belonged to You | $40,000 | -76% | 26 | -23 | $1,538 | $701,992 | 3 | China Lion Entertainment |
| 9 | Don’t Think Twice | $38,149 | -32% | 30 | -20 | $1,272 | $4,292,955 | 13 | The Film Arcade |
| 10 | The Light Between Oceans | $35,000 | -24% | 61 | -40 | $574 | $12,440,525 | 7 | Disney / DreamWorks |
| 11 | Harry & Snowman | $34,000 | 48% | 16 | 4 | $2,125 | $153,583 | 3 | FilmRise |
| 12 | Miss Hokusai | $25,042 | — | 2 | — | $12,521 | $25,042 | 1 | GKIDS |
| 13 | Captain Fantastic | $24,575 | 8% | 39 | 13 | $630 | $5,846,325 | 15 | Bleecker Street |
| 14 | Hunt for the Wilderpeople | $18,150 | -37% | 23 | -16 | $789 | $5,166,276 | 17 | The Orchard |
| 15 | Christine (2016) | $12,372 | — | 1 | — | $12,372 | $12,372 | 1 | The Orchard |
| 16 | Greater | $12,123 | -39% | 15 | -13 | $808 | $1,950,597 | 8 | Hammond Entertainment |
| 17 | The Hollars | $8,024 | -55% | 21 | -19 | $382 | $980,713 | 8 | Sony Pictures Classics |
| 18 | Hillsong – Let Hope Rise | $7,000 | -77% | 18 | -18 | $389 | $2,379,745 | 5 | |
| 19 | The Greasy Strangler | $6,000 | -73% | 5 | -6 | $1,200 | $37,193 | 2 | FilmRise |
| 20 | The Best Democracy Money Can Buy: A Tale of Billionaires & Ballot Bandits | $5,800 | 671% | 1 | -1 | $5,800 | $28,451 | 4 | Cinema Libre Studio |
| 21 | Coming Through the Rye | $4,000 | — | 1 | — | $4,000 | $4,000 | 1 | Eammon Films |
| 22 | White Girl | $2,500 | -70% | 1 | -1 | $2,500 | $198,651 | 7 | FilmRise |
| 23 | Newtown | $2,240 | — | 3 | — | $747 | $12,840 | 2 | Abramorama |
| 24 | Demon | $1,692 | -61% | 6 | -6 | $282 | $96,569 | 6 | The OrchardThe Orchard |
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