Playing out like a standard superhero sequel, Avengers: Age of Ultron dominated the box office in its second weekend while the female-driven action-comedy Hot Pursuit was nowhere to be found.
Marvel’s Avengers: Age of Ultron dropped 60% from its blockbuster opening to a weekend estimate of $77M, bringing its domestic cume to an astounding $312.6M. Its international totals jumped to $562.4M making its total worldwide box office $875M. With China still left to open, Age of Ultron will soon become only the 4th film to make over $1B at the international box office so the only real question is whether it will beat the original film to take 3rd place overall behind only Avatar and Titanic. (Let me take a moment to marvel at the fact that a nearly 20-year-old film managed to make more internationally than every other film in history – excluding Avatar – has made worldwide.) Currently Age of Ultron is on a similar pace to 2013’s Iron Man 3 which fell 58% in its second weekend on its way to a $409M finish. Look for Age of Ultron to end its run around $450M domestically, which would fall well behind the first film’s $623M, but its international numbers will more than make up for that difference.
Second place belonged to Reese Witherspoon and Sofia Vergara’s Hot Pursuit which took in a disappointing $13.3M, according to estimates, from 3,003 theaters for a per screen average of a mediocre $4,429. A Rotten Tomatoes score of 6% did not help matters. You know what got a higher Rotten Tomatoes score? 2003’s From Justin to Kelly. A CinemaScore of C+ shows that it wasn’t just critics that really disliked Hot Pursuit. Hopefully studios see this as an aberration and not a sign that female-led action-comedies aren’t worth pursuing. Pun intended.
The rest of the top 10 had relatively slim drops and a couple even managed to jump up a tick. Third place belonged to The Age of Adaline which slipped only 10% to $5.6M, according to estimates, bringing its cume to $31.5M for Lionsgate. The current King of the domestic box office, Furious 7, dropped 20% to an estimated $5.3M bringing its monstrous cume to $338M domestically, with another $1.128B coming in from overseas bringing its worldwide total to $1.46B. Domestically it’ll be passed by Age of Ultron in the next few days, but it’ll be a close race worldwide over the next few weeks, depending on how big Age of Ultron is in China. Rounding out the top five was Paul Blart: Mall Cop 2 which took in an estimated $5.2M this weekend, a drop of only 12% from last weekend, bringing its total to $58M for Sony.
In sixth place, up one spot from last week, was the critically acclaimed Ex Machina which added 725 screens this weekend and jumped 52% from last weekend’s total to an estimated $3.47M, bringing its total to $15.7M, a new record for studio A24, beating out 2013’s Spring Breakers. The animated Home ended in seventh place, falling 14% from last weekend to an estimated $3M bringing its total to a very positive $162M.
Up 3% from last weekend was Woman in Gold which took in an estimated $1.65M this weekend bringing its total to just under $27M. Ninth place belonged to Disney’s Cinderella which made $1.57M, according to estimates, bringing its cume to $196M. I feel like Disney is going to do one last push to get it to the $200M mark before it leaves theaters. Rounding out the top 10 was the Universal horror film Unfriended which scared up an estimated $1.4M this weekend, bringing its total to $31M.
Debuting well outside the top 10 was The D Train, starring Jack Black and James Marsden. Opening in a reasonably wide 1,009 theaters, the film made only $469,000 for a per screen average of $465. Disappointing is an understatement here.
The top ten films grossed an estimated $117.7M which was down 5% from last year when Neighbors opened at number one with $49M; and down 22% from 2013 when Iron Man 3 held the top spot with $72.5M.
