Three more wide releases enter the marketplace looking to pick up whatever scraps are left of the summer box office. Leading the way could be the film with the least number of screens. The faith-based drama War Room tops the freshman class in advance ticket sales and momentum may carry it into a strong debut with a rock solid average.
Sony should see a substantial portion of the business come from African American audiences with females likely to outnumber males. The few reviews that come out will be irrelevant as far as commercial potential goes. Opening in over 1,100 theaters, War Room may debut to about $8M this weekend.
Owen Wilson enters action hero territory with No Escape starring opposite former 007 Pierce Brosnan. The R-rated international thriller from The Weinstein Co. will play to mature adults who have better movie options right now, and many non-movie distractions as well. This one has VOD written all over it, despite a very aggressive roll-out for a late August flick. The Wednesday launch resulted in a modest $1.2M and the five-day bow should not be very impressive. Playing in 3,355 locations by Friday, No Escape might open to around $8M for the weekend and $10M across five days.
Zac Efron goes into DJ mode with the drama We Are Your Friends which is targeting older teens and young adults. The former squeaky clean Disney star has done a terrific job jumping into more mature roles and R-rated films and still selling tickets. This offering, however, has little heat and is unlikely to make much. Reviews have been mixed. Opening in over 2,200 locations, We Are Your Friends could debut to about $6M.
Hoping to become only the second movie all summer to three-peat (a dino-sequel being the other) Straight Outta Compton should suffer a smaller decline than last time and may slide by 45%. That would give Universal about $14.5M in its third frame and a new cume of $135M.
