“Moana” Rules Again on Slow Weekend

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

BOX OFFICE REPORT

December 2-4, 2016

(estimates from BoxOfficeMojo.com)

TOP 5

Moana $28.3 million
Fantastic Beasts and
Where to Find Them		 $18.5 million
Arrival $7.3 million
Allied $7.0 million
Doctor Strange $6.4 million

On one of the slowest box office weekends of the year, audiences went back for leftovers from Thanksgiving weekend. Disney's Moana topped the box office again with an estimated $28.3 million. It's far ahead of where Frozen was this time three years ago, but I don't expect this to become a hit of that size. Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them held second place for the second weekend in a row, though it's fallen a bit more than expected. Still, it's eating up the foreign box office and will end up as one of the year's 10 biggest movies worldwide.

Arrival swapped places with Doctor Strange, making it one of the few films this fall to have real legs. It even has an outside shot at topping $100 million. That's more than Allied can say. While its second weekend drop wasn't dramatic, it's unlikely to recoup its $85 million budget.

That leaves Doctor Strange to last its final weekend in the top five, taking in a mere $6.4 million. It's officially the MCU's No. 2 origin story behind Iron Man, once again proving fans will flock to any of Disney's Marvel releases.

Outside the top 5:

  • This Weekend's Indie Champ: Jackie, the acclaimed biopic of Jackie Kennedy in the aftermath of the JFK assassination. Natalie Portman has won raves for her performance and in its first weekend, the film averaged $55,000 on each of its five screens.
  • Incarnate, the only new wide release this weekend, opened way back in ninth place. The horror flick took in a very scary $2.6 million.
  • Manchester by the Sea is blowing doors in limited release. Playing on only 156 screens, it took in more than $2.3 million this weekend, overshadowing several films playing in far more theaters.

Next week:

Another slowish weekend, but I think audiences are ready for something different. So I think Office Christmas Party will be No. 1, but with only $25 million. La La Land, which opens on only five screens, will have the year's biggest per theater average.

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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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