Weekend Box Office (November 27 - 29, 2020)
THIS WEEKEND For the fifth weekend in a row, Universal's family of companies topped the charts, this time the main studio with a strong launch for the DreamWorks Animation release The Croods: A New Age which bowed at number one with an estimated $9.7M over the Friday-to-Sunday period and $14.2M over five days. The domestic box office finally got a spark to energize the marketplace after many lackluster weeks.
By pandemic standards, this is as good as it gets. Theaters in many top cities are closed, open cinemas have capacity limits, and many movie fans are not comfortable enough yet to venture back into indoor moviegoing. Given the conditions, the toon sequel's $4,392 average from 2,211 locations was superb. Ordinarily, this film would open in about double the number of theaters.
The only other film to open at this level since the pandemic shut down theaters in March was Tenet which did $20.2M over 8 days in the US and 12 days in Canada. That film's first Friday-to-Sunday gross with both US and Canada open was estimated at $9.4M so the new Croods is in the same ballpark, even though both hits launched in different ways.
A promising road awaits as Croods earned a great A grade from CinemaScore with audiences spreading very positive word-of-mouth. As part of Universal's new deal, this PG-rated film is expected to become available at home on Premium VOD before Christmas.
The overseas launch got started too this week with Croods opening big in China with a healthy $19.2M making it the world's top market for this title. It has 10,000 theaters and 65,000 total screens there where moviegoing is more robust. More markets will open in the weeks and months ahead.
The body swapping horror-comedy Freaky dropped to second after two weeks on top and grossed an estimated $770,000, down 37%. Universal has banked $7M on this film which will go to premium VOD this Friday.
The War with Grandpa held up well dipping only 14% to an estimated $644,000 boosting the cume to $17.3M for 101 Studios. Focus followed with a pair of films. Let Him Go did $453,000 and Come Play did $387,000, according to estimates. Both films stand at $8.7M.
Liam Neeson's revenge film Honest Thief dropped 22% to an estimated $350,000 for $13.5M to date for Open Road. Tenet saw a slender 17% decline to an estimated $300,000 in its 13th weekend. Domestic is now $57.4M while the international tally broke the triple century mark at $300.4M for a new global take of $357.8M. The re-release of 1994's The Santa Clause took in some more cash with an estimated $170,000, tumbling 63%. Disney has collected about $750,000 over ten days.
The top ten films grossed an estimated $13.1M which was down 92% from last year's holiday when Frozen II stayed at number one with $86M; and down 94% from 2018's holiday when Ralph Breaks the Internet opened in the top spot with $56.2M.
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| # | Title | Nov 27 - 29 | Nov 20 - 22 | % Chg. | Theaters | Weeks | AVG | Cumulative | Distributor |
| 1 | The Croods: A New Age | $ 9,720,000 | 2,211 | 1 | $ 4,396 | $ 14,215,000 | Universal | ||
| 2 | Freaky | 800,000 | 1,220,000 | -34.4 | 1,735 | 3 | 461 | 7,059,000 | Universal |
| 3 | The War with Grandpa | 585,118 | 747,135 | -21.7 | 1,500 | 8 | 390 | 17,198,929 | 101 Studios |
| 4 | Let Him Go | 480,000 | 710,000 | -32.4 | 1,447 | 4 | 332 | 8,757,000 | Focus |
| 5 | Come Play | 387,000 | 550,000 | -29.6 | 1,029 | 5 | 376 | 8,703,000 | Focus |
| 6 | Honest Thief | 350,138 | 445,850 | -21.5 | 975 | 7 | 359 | 13,541,532 | Open Road |
| 7 | Tenet | 300,000 | 360,000 | -16.7 | 656 | 13 | 457 | 57,400,000 | Warner Bros. |
| 8 | The Santa Clause RE | 170,000 | 461,000 | -63.1 | 1,090 | 2 | 156 | 700,000 | Disney |
| 9 | Vanguard | 165,000 | 400,000 | -58.8 | 1,200 | 2 | 138 | 700,000 | Gravitas Ventures |
| 10 | The Last Vermeer | 150,000 | 225,000 | -33.3 | 896 | 2 | 167 | 490,000 | Sony |
| Top 5 | $ 11,972,118 | $ 3,688,135 | 224.6 | ||||||
| Top 10 | 13,107,256 | 5,279,985 | 148.2 | ||||||
| Top 10 vs. Thanksgiving 2019 | 13,107,256 | 167,269,351 | -92.2 | ||||||
| Top 10 vs. Thanksgiving 2018 | 13,107,256 | 203,836,618 | -93.6 | ||||||
| Below the Top 10: | |||||||||
| Frozen RE | 120,000 | 1,367 | 1 | 88 | 155,000 | Disney | |||
| True to the Game 2 | 115,000 | 161,000 | -28.6 | 180 | 4 | 639 | 1,118,000 | Imani / Faith | |
| Buddy Games | 110,000 | 150,000 | -26.7 | 397 | 2 | 277 | 329,000 | Paramount |
Last Updated: December 2, 2020 at 4:45PM ET
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