After last weekend’s break-out performance, Disney’s The Jungle Book is set to dominate the box office once again this weekend. In its initial days of release, The Jungle Book has been holding up very nicely for a film of its size, as strong word of mouth is already kicking in for the film. Disney’s recent blockbuster live-action adaptations have experienced second weekend percentage declines in the range of 46 percent to 51 percent. But BoxOffice Pro feels The Jungle Book will experience a second weekend percentage decline that is closer to the 32 percent second weekend decline of Disney’s Zootopia last month. In addition to benefiting from strong word of mouth, The Jungle Book also should benefit from playing stronger with family audiences than Disney’s previous live-action adaptions have.
With the runaway success of The Jungle Book; prospects for Universal’s The Huntsman: Winter’s War are looking dimmer than they already did in the weeks leading up to the film’s release. The follow-up to 2012’s Snow White and the Huntsman is expected to open well below its predecessor and finish in a distant second place this weekend.
The Huntsman: Winter’s War
PROS:
– 2012’s Snow White and the Huntsman had a healthy domestic box office run, as the film opened with $56.2 million and went on to gross $155.3 million in total. While The Huntsman: Winter’s War won’t come anywhere close to its predecessor, its predecessor does represent a very high starting point.
– Emily Blunt and Jessica Chastain have joined returning cast members Chris Hemsworth and Charlize Theron.
– The film will serve as the primary alternative this weekend for those moviegoers not looking to catch The Jungle Book for a second time already.
CONS:
– As mentioned, the breakout performance of The Jungle Book is sure to further limit potential for The Huntsman: Winter’s War.
– While The Huntsman: Winter’s War had been building up steam on Twitter over the past couple weeks, the film has rapidly lost momentum on Twitter this week. That sudden turnaround suggests that the film’s online activity levels have been significantly inflated by the film’s early overseas launch.
– Critical reviews for the film are poor, as The Hunstman: Winter’s War currently has a Tomatometer of just 19 percent on Rotten Tomatoes.
– With Kristen Stewart no longer involved with the franchise as Snow White, it appears that the film has come across to moviegoers as being more of a spin-off than a prequel.
Top 10 Forecast
Thanks in large part to the expected continued strength of The Jungle Book, BoxOffice Pro projects this weekend’s top ten films will total $123.6 million. That would represent a strong 54.3 percent increase over the $80.1 million top ten total of the same weekend last year. That frame was led by the $17.8 million fourth weekend take of Universal’s Furious 7, saw Sony’s Paul Blart: Mall Cop 2 gross $14.8 million in its second weekend and Lionsgate’s The Age of Adaline open in third place with a very solid $13.2 million.
Check out our complete forecast in the table below.
| Title | Distributor | Weekend | Domestic Total Through Sunday, Apr. 24 |
|---|---|---|---|
| The Jungle Book (2016) | Disney | $67,000,000 | $198,000,000 |
| The Huntsman: Winter’s War | Universal | $22,000,000 | $22,000,000 |
| Barbershop: The Next Cut | Warner Bros. / New Line | $11,300,000 | $36,600,000 |
| Zootopia | Disney | $6,300,000 | $316,100,000 |
| The Boss | Universal | $5,500,000 | $48,800,000 |
| Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice | Warner Bros. | $4,700,000 | $318,600,000 |
| Criminal (2016) | Lionsgate / Summit | $2,700,000 | $10,400,000 |
| My Big Fat Greek Wedding 2 | Universal | $1,900,000 | $55,100,000 |
| Miracles from Heaven | Sony / Columbia | $1,100,000 | $58,800,000 |
| Compadres | Lionsgate / Pantelion | $1,050,000 | $1,050,000 |
Daniel Garris, Shawn Robbins and Alex Edghill contributed to this report.
Share this post