Weekend Box Office (November 24 - 26, 2017)
THIS WEEKEND Super heroes will fight the dead this Thanksgiving holiday season as current box office champ Justice League risks being booted from the top spot after only one week by the latest offering from the Pixar juggernaut, Coco.
The PG-rated toon takes place in Mexico and is the first film in some time from the animation giant to center its story on human characters. As usual, reviews have been superb and word-of-mouth is sure to be very positive too. Coco stands a good chance of delivering one of the top five best Thanksgiving openings ever.
Pixar was just in this same situation in 2015 with two films opening in the same year. The summer title (Inside Out) did gangbusters while the turkey weekend pic (The Good Dinosaur) sunk to company lows. Many did not need another story from this acclaimed studio in one year. The studio is hoping not to repeat that feeling. Commercial appeal for Coco is much better and while some current films do have appeal to children, competition aimed exclusively to kids is low.
Reaching the heights of last year's colorful and musical smash Moana seems unlikely. But getting up towards those levels could happen. Entering 3,987 locations, Coco may come away with about $49M over the Friday-to-Sunday weekend and $70M across the five-day holiday period starting Wednesday.
Denzel Washington saw his latest film Roman J. Israel, Esq. debut in platform release last weekend and the numbers were not exactly on fire with a $15,500 average from four houses. But the national audience gets the chance to see the PG-13 pic starting this weekend as Sony is now out in 1,648 locations as of Wednesday.
Denzel has a loyal fan base, but his Pelican Brief co-star Julia Robeerts has a firm grip on mature adults right now with the hit Wonder which is riding feel-good buzz which really sells at this time of year. Roman might debut to about $7M this weekend and $10M over five days.
Following its below expectations premiere last weekend, Justice League may be set to drop out of the top spot but will try to catch fans over the long weekend with holiday help. Comic book movies typically attract a huge surge upfront. With the exception of Wonder Woman, the DCEU films have tumbled 65-70% on the second weekend. Thanksgiving will help lessen the blow, but with negative buzz circulating, a significant decline is likely. A 50% fall would put Justice League at about $47M for the Friday-to-Sunday span and $181M after the second weekend. A final in the $260M neighborhood seems likely which would be $70M below last year's Batman v Superman.
Get earlier box office updates and analysis by following BoxOfficeGuru.com on Twitter.
Watch the trailer for Pacific Rim Uprising.
LAST YEAR A new toon from Disney took the top spot from a Warner Bros. franchise film over the turkey session. Moana bowed to $56.6M and $82.1M over five days on its way to a $248.8M final. Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them dropped to second with $45.1M while the super hero hit Doctor Strange took third with $13.7M. Rounding out the top five were the new Brad Pitt film Allied with $12.7M and the sci-fi holdover Arrival at $11.5M.
This column is updated three times each week: Thursday (upcoming weekend's summary), Sunday (post-weekend analysis with estimates), and Monday night (actuals). Opinions expressed in this column are those solely of the author.
Last Updated: November 22, 2017 at 2:00PM ET
©1997 - 2017 Box Office Guru