Weekend Box Office: “Birds” Fly to Number One

Sony Animation’s The Angry Birds Movie flew to the top spot at the North America box office this weekend. The movie adaptation of the popular mobile phone game easily beat out a pair of R-rated flicks making their debut –Neighbors 2 and The Nice Guys-, both which opened to underwhelming numbers.

Business was down approximately 10% from one year ago at this time when Tomorrowland led a weak Memorial Day weekend with $33 million in its first three days. Business should pick up somewhat next weekend when X-Men: Apocalypse and Alice Through the Looking Glass arrive for the 2016 Memorial Day weekend.


Despite critics flipping it The Bird, The Angry Birds Movie swooped into 3,932 theaters this weekend where it collected an estimated $39.4 million. The movie also collected $55 million from overseas markets, where it opened last weekend. Ticket buyers enjoyed the new animated comedy. They gave the movie an “A+” rating on CinemaScore, which should help Birds fly high over the next few weeks. The opening marks the third biggest opening for a Sony Animation feature, right behind the $48.5 million for Hotel Transylvania 2 and the $42.5 million debut for the first Hotel Transylvania feature.

With America spending nearly $40 million on a movie based on a game they can play on their phone for free, one can only hope that Lars Von Trier’s Candy Crush can’t be too far behind. And if that doesn’t get off the ground, there is apparently an $80 million Tetris movie in the works. Yes. Tetris.

In other news…

After commanding the box office for two straight weeks, Captain America: Civil War moved down a spot to second place this weekend. The Disney blockbuster lost 55% of its sophomore session crowds to earn an estimated $33.1 million from 4,226 theaters. After three weeks, the domestic haul for Cap and crew stands at a massive $347.4 million. That amount is good enough to place Civil War 35th on the all-time highest domestic earners.

Civil War will pass Deadpool to become the biggest superhero flick of 2016 within the next week. It should also be able to pass the $409 million earned by Iron Man 3 three summers ago by the end of its run. The Marvel Studios release also broke through the billion-dollar mark on Friday. As of today, the overall global total is $1.05 billion.

In third place was the Universal sequel Neighbors 2: Sorority Rising with a respectable $21.8 million from 3,384 theaters. The follow up to the 2014 sleeper hit Neighbors opened 55% lower than the original film did despite mostly positive reviews from critics. Seth Rogen, Zac Efron and Rose Byrne reprise their roles from the first film and are joined by Chloe Grace Moretz and Selena Gomez. The film scored a 61% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes from critics and a “B” rating from CinemaScore.

In fourth place was Warner’s action comedy The Nice Guys with a disappointing $11.3 million from 2,865 theaters. The Ryan Gosling/Russell Crowe scored big with the critics, who gave the film a 90% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes, but didn’t seem to click with ticket buyers. Nice Guys was directed by Shane Black and produced by Joel Silver, who last teamed up on the 2005 cult classic Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang.

Rounding out the top five was Disney’s The Jungle Book with $11 million from 3,460 theaters. Now in its sixth week of release, the family adventure hit has bagged $327.4 million so far and is still aiming to end its run with a terrific $340 million.

The remainder of the top ten was as follows:

  1. Money Monster (Sony) $7 million (-52%); $27 million
  2. The Darkness (HTR) $2.3 million (-52%); $8.4 million
  3. Zootopia (Disney) $1.7 million (-40%); $334 million
  4. The Huntsman: Winter’s War (Universal) $1.1 million (-55%); $47 million
  5. Mother’s Day (2016) (Open Road Films) $1.1 million (-66%); $31.2 million

After opening to $103 million overseas this weekend, watch for X-Men: Apocalypse to dominate the North America box office next weekend with Alice making a solid second place debut.

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