The box office is already looking like it will have a better August than the terrible month that occurred a year ago, as Warner Bros.’ “Barbie” leads a quartet of solid holdovers and new releases with an estimated $52 million in its third weekend.
Having already passed $400 million domestic and $800 million globally earlier this week, “Barbie” will now pass $450 million in North America as it continues barreling towards the $1 billion global mark. It is also set to become at least the highest-grossing domestic release of the year as it is 5% ahead of the pace set by “The Super Mario Bros. Movie” this past spring.
In second place is Paramount’s “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem,” which is off to a solid start with a $30 million 3-day and $45 million 5-day opening against a reported budget of $70 million.
With Universal and Sony earning box office success from animated films made on a fraction of the budgets of live-action tentpoles, Paramount is set to get in on that with “Mutant Mayhem,” the first of seven animated franchise films on its slate over the next two years.
And like DreamWorks’ “Puss in Boots: The Last Wish” and Pixar’s “Elemental,” “Mutant Mayhem” is looking for a long box office run sustained by weeks of strong word-of-mouth among families. The “Ninja Turtles” film has strong reception with an A on CinemaScore and Rotten Tomatoes scores of 96% critics and 93% audience.
Universal’s “Oppenheimer” is in third with $28 million in its third weekend, pushing it past “Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania” for sixth on the year’s domestic charts with $228 million. The film has also passed $550 million worldwide, eclipsing the unadjusted global total of director Christopher Nolan’s 2017 film “Dunkirk.”
Just behind “Oppenheimer” is Warner Bros.’ “Meg 2: The Trench,” which is opening to $27-28 million from 3,503 theaters. While that matches pre-release tracking, it is below the $45 million opening that the first “Meg” earned in 2018.
It is difficult to say whether “Meg 2” would have been able to earn a higher opening weekend if it had lead star Jason Statham around to promote the film instead of marching on strike with the rest of SAG-AFTRA, but audience reception has been mixed-to-positive with a B- on CinemaScore and a 71% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes, compared to a B+ and 43% for the first “Meg.” The film carries a $139 million budget co-financed by China Media Capital.
