By Chris Kavan - 04/15/18 at 10:26 PM CT
Dwayne Johnson can breath a sigh of relief. Though it was neck-and-neck with A Quiet Place, Rampage eventually came out on top to win the weekend. The opening may not be as rock solid as one would hope, but the raging beasts earned decent enough reviews and audiences seemed happy as well. The bad news is that the film has just one more week to impress before Avengers makes all the money. Speaking of A Quiet Place, the horror film nabbed a stupendous second-week hold and is shaping up to be one of the highest-grossing horror films of all time - and this based on an original story. It was also good news for Truth or Dare, despite withering reviews and strong competition, the film had a solid third-place finish. Isle of Dogs had a decent expansion while Beirut and Sgt. Stubby fell well outside the top 10.
1) RAMPAGE
Dwayne Johnson continues to deliver at the box office as Rampage took the top spot with $34.5 million. While that is not a monster start for the $120 million picture, it did open ahead of both The Mummy ($31.7 million) and Johnson's Hercules ($29.8 million). If it plays out similarly to San Andreas, another Johnson pic, it will wind up in the $90-$95 million range, though a lot is going to depend on how it holds up against The Avengers: Infinity War for its long-term prospects. The film drew a slightly more male (55%) audience that came in 63% over the age of 25. It earned a very good "A-" Cinemascore, better than the 50% average among critics. The film opened to the third-best video game opening of all time behind Tomb Raider ($47 million) and Angry Birds ($38 million) as well as the second-best opening for solo Johnson behind San Andreas ($54.5 million). The film had a decent international opening with $114.5 million, led by $55 million from China. Next week it should have no trouble but again, the big test will be on the 27th when Marvel's next big thing enters the ring.
2)
A QUIET PLACE
After one of the more impressive horror openings, A Quiet Place showed little signs of slowing down, dipping a light 35.1% and coming in just behind Rampage with $32.6 million. The film is just shy of $100 million with $99.6 million - and Mondays actuals may bump it up to that hallowed territory. That is the sixth-best second weekend on record for any horror film (and that is counting the Jurassic Park films as "horror"). That drop is also one of the best on record, topping the likes of Split (fell 36%) and The Conjuring (dipped 47%). It will likely rival Get Out ($175 million) in terms of total gross before it's done and is a film Paramount really needed, becoming their biggest hit since Star Trek Beyond back in 2016. It will also likely top Ready Player One (sitting at $114 million currently) as the second-best picture of the year behind Black Panther... though it will drop to third once The Avengers drops. No matter, A Quiet Place is a rare horror film indeed, huge opening, great second-week hold and great second-week grosses.
3)
TRUTH OR DARE
With A Quiet Place doing so well, it is frankly impressive that Blumhouse's Truth or Dare managed to open where it did. The film got savaged by critics, but still opened with $19 million. That is just below the opening of Ouija ($19.8 million), which went on to gross over $50 million. Typical for a horror film targeting a teen-centric audience, the film was quite front-loaded and the "B-" Cinemascore, while not terrible, doesn't suggest word-of-mouth will elevate this to A Quiet Place-level second weekend. Given the $5 million budget, however, Truth or Dare is going to wind up just fine, even if it drops like a rock next weekend. It might have trouble getting to $50 million, but $40 million is much more likely and proves that horror - innovative or not - is going to find an audience.
4)
READY PLAYER ONE
Steven Spielberg's ode to pop culture nerdom dipped 54.5% in its third weekend as competition continued to heat up. With $11.2 million more in the bank, the film now stands at $114.5 million and, for the time being, is still the second-best domestic film of 2018. Warner Bros. essentially sabotaged... Warner Bros. as Rampage likely accounted for much of the audience that should have seen Ready Player One. But $114 million is nothing to sneeze at - and neither is the $360.2 million overseas total (with Japan still to come). It will be interesting to see if the film can reach that $150 million mark or not, but if it falls short this is still one of the more interesting films of the year and is sure to be a big hit with home audiences due to the sheer amount of stuff going on to catch in the background.
5)
BLOCKERS
After a solid opening, Blockers took a big hit in week two, dropping nearly 50% and adding $10.29 million to its total, that now stands at $37 million. Once again, it was the competition, this time from PG-13 rated Truth or Dare, that likely took away the R-rated film's audience. Blockers still has gas left in the tank, however, and the $21 million film is still looking at a total of around $60 million, maybe not as good as things looked after opening, but far from a disaster. If studios want to blame someone, they can go after Disney, who screwed all this up by moving The Avengers from May to April and therefore adding more chaos to an already-packed schedule.
Outside the top five: Wes Anderson's Isle of Dogs expanded to the tune of 1385 theaters (playing in 1939 total) and jumped 9.6% rising from 10th to 7th place with a $5 million weekend and new $18.45 million total. The film should wind up in the $25-$30 million range - not bad at all for an adult-skewing stop-motion animated film.
Sgt. Stubby and Beirut both struggled to find much of an audience. Jon Hamm's old-school action film opened early on Wednesday, but could only bring in $2 million ($1.65 million for the weekend) for a 13th place finish. The indie animated film Sgt. Stubby: An American Hero couldn't even break $1 million, earning just $970,000 for a 17th place finish.
Next weekend brings us the comedy sequel Super Troopers 2, the female-driven comedy I Feel Pretty and the Thriller, Traffik.
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