Battle at the Box Office 8/7
The Dark Tower opened in first place despite getting eviscerated by critics but it was a weak opening for the weakest overall weekend of the summer.
The Dark Tower made $19.5 million, which puts it just slightly ahead of the opening for the Ghost in Shell movie from earlier this year and Jupiter Ascending but it was the second highest ever opening for a Stephen King adaptation behind 1408, although that’s not really saying much considering how batshit insane most King movies are. The movie also made $8 million internationally in 19 countries and will be rolling out to more for the rest of the month but it will probably still struggle to top it’s $60 million budget and the future movies and a TV series that were planned might be rethought.
Dunkirk dropped to second with another $17.6 million, putting it over $133 million for it’s three weeks out and it’s currently the seventh highest grossing movie of the summer. It only dropped about 33% from last week, so it should stay strong for the next few weeks if that trend continues.
The Emoji Movie took third with $12.4 million, bringing it to just over $49 million for it’s two weeks out while Girl Trip took fourth with $11.4 million and it’s made over four times it’s budget back already with just over $85 million.
Kidnap rounded out the top 5 with $10.2 million, exceeding some very modest expectations. It’s quite a bit off from the last Halle Berry kidnapping thriller, The Call, which made over $17 million in it’s opening weekend in 2013. It’s the 16th best opening for Berry between Perfect Stranger and Cloud Atlas.
In 8th place, Detroit did not match it’s critical acclaim at the box office, only making $7.2 million as it expanded to over 3,000 theaters and that puts it at #23 on the list of worst openings in over 3,000 theaters, right next to movies like the most recent Diary of a Wimpy Kid and Collateral Beauty. Kathryn Bigelow’s last, “based on true events” drama, Zero Dark Thirty, made over $24 million when it finally expanded wide in January of 2013.