Weekend Box Office: ‘Black Panther’ Reigns Supreme With $1 Billion Worldwide
To an already impressive list of achievements we can now add one more record to Black Panther’s resume: It’s officially the first Marvel Cinematic Universe movie to remain the number one film in the country for four straight weeks. With an estimated $41.1 million in theaters, it is now over $1 billion in worldwide ticket sales. Here’s the full weekend box office chart:
Film | Weekend | Per Screen | Total | |
1 | Black Panther | $41,136,000 (-38%) | $10,435 | $562,015,601 |
2 | A Wrinkle in Time | $33,316,000 | $8,371 | $33,316,000 |
3 | The Strangers: Prey at Night | $10,480,000 | $4,253 | $10,480,000 |
4 | Red Sparrow | $8,150,000 (-51%) | $2,660 | $33,537,766 |
5 | Game Night | $7,905,000 (-24%) | $2,582 | $31,118,743 |
6 | Peter Rabbit | $6,800,000 (-32%) | $2,185 | $45,045,632 |
7 | Death Wish | $6,600,000 (-49%) | $2,290 | $93,457,806 |
8 | The Hurricane Heist | $3,150,000 | $1,311 | $3,150,000 |
9 | Annihilation | $3,150,000 (-43%) | $1,843 | $26,094,514 |
10 | Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle | $2,755,000 (-37%) | $1,277 | $397,263,020 |
Fending off the first really serious box-office challenger in its run to date, Black Panther continued its strong hold in theaters, dropping just 38 percent from the previous weekend. With $562 million in the U.S. alone, it’s the second-biggest domestic hit in the entire MCU behind only the original Avengers. Its $1.078 billion worldwide makes it the MCU’s fifth-biggest worldwide hit, and the 21st biggest film worldwide ever. Marvel and Disney are going to be making money off Wakanda forever.
Disney’s financial prospects for the number two movie of the weekend aren’t quite as bright. A Wrinkle in Time, based on the beloved children’s book, opened in second place on the box-office chart with an estimated $33.3 million in ticket sales, below the $35 million predicted by Disney. With that number, it will be tough to turn a major profit on the film, which reportedly cost in the neighborhood of $150 million. The “B” the film got from CinemaScore suggests audiences that did see the film were mixed as well; we’ll see how that plays out in terms of word of mouth next weekend.
Third place on the box office chart had an even worse CinemaScore (C): The Strangers: Prey at Night, the sequel to the 2008 cult horror hit. The new film’s $10.4 million opening was essentially half of what the original Strangers made in its opening weekend a decade ago; it may be a case of waiting too long to trot out the sequel. Fourth place belonged to Red Sparrow, Jennifer Lawrence’s spy thriller, which has now made $31.1 million in theaters after 10 days of release. In fifth place was Game Night, the new comedy starring Rachel McAdams and Jason Bateman. The news for that film was better; it dropped just 24 percent from last weekend and grossed $7.9 million even as it shed about 400 screens around the country, a good indication that the audiences who are seeing the film are liking it and encouraging others to check it out.
Still, the number one comedy in the country, at least from a per-screen perspective, wasn’t Game Night. It was The Death of Stalin, the new film from Veep creator Armando Iannucci. In four theaters around the country, The Death of Stalin grossed a whopping $181,000, for a PSA of $45,327, four times the average of the next biggest film, Hong Sang-soo’s Claire’s Camera starring Isabelle Huppert.
Gallery - The Biggest Worldwide Hits Ever: