“Boo!” Madea Scares Up a Halloween Repeat

By Kip Mooney • On • In News, Weekend Box Office Report News, Weekend Box Office Report 0

BOX OFFICE REPORT

October 28-30, 2016

(estimates from BoxOfficeMojo.com)

 

TOP 5

Boo! A Madea Halloween  $16.6 million
Inferno $15.0 million
Jack Reacher: Never Go Back  $9.5 million
The Accountant  $8.4 million
Ouija: Origin of Evil $7.0 million

 

In the last weekend before Halloween, nothing could top Madea's Boo! The latest Tyler Perry comedy repeated at No. 1, taking in an estimated $16.6 million. That's a drop of only 41.5 percent, exceptionally low for any Tyler Perry movie. It's the last time a Tyler Perry movie has repeated at the top since 2009's Madea Goes to Jail. This one won't get to $90 million, but it's likely to be Perry's second-biggest movie ever.

 

Boo! beat out Inferno, Tom Hanks' third go-round as symbologist/adventurer Robert Langdon. This has to be viewed as a major disappointment for all involved. The last installment, 2009's Angels & Demons, opened with $46.2 million. This is less than one third of that opening, which was down from 2006's The Da Vinci Code. Even though overseas grosses are making up for it, this is likely the last we've seen of this franchise.

 

Jack Reacher: Never Go Back slipped to third, and it won't make nearly as much as The Accountant did without the name recognition or the Tom Cruise star power. Ouija: Origin of Evil couldn't scare up much more than $7 million, so this franchise is likely done as well.

 

Outside the top 5:

  • This Weekend's Indie Champ: Once again it's Moonlight, which I called the best film of the year so far. It $25,023 on 36 screens. It will play nationwide beginning next week.
  • Bollywood musical Ae Dil Hai Mushkil debuted at No. 10, taking in $2.1 million on just 302 screens.
  • Two different rock docs had wildly different receptions at the box office. Gimme Danger, about the life of punk pioneer Iggy Pop, averaged $14,675 on just three screens. But Supersonic, about Britpop superstars Oasis, averaged a weak $1,183 on 14 screens.

 

Next week: The holiday season begins in earnest, with Doctor Strange taking on Trolls. There's no way the Marvel movie isn't No. 1 with at least $80 million. There's been a glut of animated movies this year, with several more on the way, so I think Trolls will be lucky to make more than $30 million. That leaves Mel Gibson's World War II drama Hacksaw Ridge as the odd man out. Anything more than $15 million would be a shock.

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About Kip Mooney

Kip Mooney
Like many film critics born during and after the 1980s, my hero is Roger Ebert. The man was already the best critic in the nation when he won the Pulitzer in 1975, but his indomitable spirit during and after his recent battle with cancer keeps me coming back to read not only his reviews but his insightful commentary on the everyday. But enough about a guy you know a lot about. I knew I was going to be a film critic—some would say a snob—in middle school, when I had to voraciously defend my position that The Royal Tenenbaums was only a million times better than Adam Sandler’s remake of Mr. Deeds. From then on, I would seek out Wes Anderson’s films and avoid Sandler’s like the plague. Still, I like to think of myself as a populist, and I’ll be just as likely to see the next superhero movie as the next Sundance sensation. The thing I most deplore in a movie is laziness. I’d much rather see movies with big ambitions try and fail than movies with no ambitions succeed at simply existing. I’m also a big advocate of fun-bad movies like The Room and most of Nicolas Cage’s work. In the past, I’ve written for The Dallas Morning News and the North Texas Daily, which I edited for a semester. I also contributed to Dallas-based Pegasus News, which in the circle of life, is now part of The Dallas Morning News, where I got my big break in 2007. Eventually, I’d love to write and talk about film full-time, but until that’s a viable career option, I work as an auditor for Wells Fargo. I hope to one day meet my hero, go to the Toronto International Film Festival, and compete on Jeopardy. Until then, I’m excited to share my love of film with you.

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