Weekend Box Office (January 4 - 6, 2019)

by Gitesh Pandya

THIS WEEKEND It was threepeat time for Aquaman as the DC hero easily held onto his box office crown with an estimated $30.7M, dropping a reasonable 41% in the third round. Crushing the quarter-billion domestic mark on Saturday, the PG-13 blockbuster has now banked a stellar $259.7M to date and is well on its way into the $300M club. Aquaman certainly has a shot at beating the $325.1M of Suicide Squad and the $330.4M of Batman v Superman to become the second biggest film in the DC Extended Universe behind Wonder Woman's $412.6M.

Globally, Arthur Curry smashed the $900M mark this weekend and is looking set to crush the magical $1 billion barrier next weekend. This frame saw a solid $56.2M from 79 international markets pushing the cume to $681M and the worldwide tally to an eye-popping $940.7M. In the last few days, Aquaman has sped past the final global totals of many comic book movies such as Spider-Man: Homecoming, Batman v Superman, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, Venom, and Thor: Ragnarok. China leads the way with an incredible $282.8M, Italy saw an impressive opening week of $7M since New Year's Day, and Japan is still to come on February 8.

Early January has long been a popular time for scary movies as audiences move past cheery and happy films from the holiday season. Sony took advantage and opened its new thriller Escape Room in second place by beating expectations with a $18M debut, according to estimates. The PG-13 film averaged a good $6,625 from 2,717 locations. Reviews were mixed but paying moviegoers enjoyed the horror pic as the CinemaScore grade was a B, quite good for this genre.

Suffering the second largest decline in the top ten was the musical Mary Poppins Returns which fell 44% to an estimated $15.8M despite facing no new direct competition. Disney has banked $138.7M to date in North America and another $119.2M from overseas markets for a global tally of $257.9M.

Declining by only 31% was the acclaimed animated film Spider-Man: Into The Spider-Verse with an estimated $13M giving Sony $133.9M to date on its way to the $170M neighborhood. With $141.5M overseas, the worldwide cume now sits at $275.4M.

Taking fifth place was the action spin-off Bumblebee with an estimated $12.8M, down 39%, and $97.1M to date for Paramount. The film enjoyed a large $59.4M opening weekend in China lifting the offshore total to $192M and the global gross to $289.1M. Finishing north of $500M is possible.

With so much attention on big-budget action tentpoles this winter, Clint Eastwood is quietly on his way to scoring his third $100M+ hit in four years with The Mule. The Warner Bros. release dipped 26% to an estimated $9M in its fourth round for a new sum of $81.1M. As a director it will be Eastwood's sixth career hit in nine-digit territory.

Backed by Golden Globe nominations, Annapurna's Vice slipped only 25% to an estimated $5.8M pushing the cume up to $29.8M. Jennifer Lopez followed with her comedy Second Act grossing an estimated $4.9M, down 33%, for a $32.9M cume for STX.

Disney's hit toon Ralph Breaks the Internet got very close to its predecessor's level by collecting another estimate of $4.7M this weekend, off 30%, giving the wi-fi flick $187.2M. It is now just days away from passing the $189.4M of 2012's Wreck-it Ralph. Global is now $404.8M. John C. Reilly also took the next spot with Holmes & Watson which plunged 54% to an estimated $3.4M putting Sony at only $28.4M.

The top ten films grossed an estimated $118.1M which was down 18% from last year when Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle climbed into the number one spot with $37.2M; and off 2% from 2017 when Hidden Figures expanded nationwide and took the top position with $22.8M.


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# Title Jan 4 - 6 Dec 28 - 30 % Chg. Theaters Weeks AVG Cumulative Distributor
1 Aquaman $ 31,003,280 $ 52,114,571 -40.5 4,184 3 $ 7,410 $ 260,024,160 Warner Bros.
2 Escape Room 18,239,172 2,717 1 6,713 18,239,172 Sony
3 Mary Poppins Returns 15,860,957 28,353,117 -44.1 4,090 3 3,878 138,817,262 Disney
4 Bumblebee 13,202,603 20,906,146 -36.8 3,597 3 3,670 97,555,743 Paramount
5 Spider-Man: Into The Spider-Verse 13,126,885 18,794,532 -30.2 3,419 4 3,839 133,978,231 Sony
6 The Mule 9,109,693 12,162,024 -25.1 3,212 4 2,836 81,177,803 Warner Bros.
7 Vice 5,734,509 7,768,371 -26.2 2,534 2 2,263 29,727,497 Annapurna
8 Second Act 4,755,291 7,359,691 -35.4 2,523 3 1,885 32,792,366 STX
9 Ralph Breaks the Internet 4,673,522 6,726,184 -30.5 2,050 7 2,280 187,152,693 Disney
10 Holmes & Watson 3,302,827 7,411,522 -55.4 2,780 2 1,188 28,313,749 Sony
11 Bohemian Rhapsody 2,368,141 2,350,527 0.7 1,080 10 2,193 193,644,966 Fox
12 Mary Queen of Scots 2,146,860 2,703,065 -20.6 1,052 5 2,041 13,424,885 Focus
13 The Favourite 1,903,292 2,428,285 -21.6 771 7 2,469 19,297,628 Fox Searchlight
14 If Beale Street Could Talk 1,843,384 766,224 140.6 335 4 5,503 4,409,248 Annapurna
15 Green Book 1,807,575 1,895,000 -4.6 566 8 3,194 35,230,831 Universal
16 On The Basis of Sex 1,609,454 686,355 134.5 112 2 14,370 3,707,849 Focus
17 The Grinch 1,168,395 4,122,245 -71.7 1,662 9 703 269,622,130 Universal
18 Simmba 1,005,087 1,758,563 -42.8 292 2 3,442 4,115,808 Reliance
19 Creed II 922,650 1,584,479 -41.8 893 7 1,033 114,296,602 MGM
20 Instant Family 702,529 954,155 -26.4 604 8 1,163 66,212,557 Paramount
Top 5 $ 91,432,897 $ 132,330,390 -30.9
Top 10 119,008,739 165,718,403 -28.2
Top 20 134,486,106 183,641,623 -26.8
Top 20 vs. 2018 134,486,106 161,071,502 -16.5

Last Updated: January 6, 2019 at 12:35PM ET

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