This weekend featured a heated race between four new films that opened in wide release. As of Sunday morning, it appears some have fared better than others.
The big winner is Disney and Pixar’s Cars 3, which is speeding to $53.5 million from 4,256 locations, putting it in first place. That’s a lower opening than Cars ($60.1 million) and Cars 2 ($66.1 million), but still enough to win the weekend. The first two Cars movies combined have made more than $435 million in the U.S. and $1 billion globally. The Cars films are far from Disney (DIS) and Pixar’s highest earners, but Cars 3 is another example that even a decent opening for the duo is a victory in the big picture.
The movie comes from director Brian Fee, who was a storyboard artist on the first two Cars films, as well as Ratatouille and Wall-E. The ensemble voice cast of Cars 3 includes Owen Wilson, Cristela Alonzo, Armie Hammer, Larry the Cable Guy, Bonnie Hunt, Nathan Fillion, Kerry Washington, and Lea DeLaria.
Cars 3 bumps Wonder Woman out of first place, but the super hero movie continues to show strong. With an estimated $40.7 million from 4,018 locations, the Warner Bros. and DC Comics film is seeing another extremely low drop of 32% from last weekend.
Otherwise, Tupac biopic All Eyez on Me from Lionsgate and Summit is beating out expectations with an estimated $27.1 million from 2,471 locations. Demetrius Shipp Jr. plays the mythologized rapper. Benny Bloom—who has two feature films and a long list of music videos on his resume—directed the film that explores Shakur’s origins, rise, and imprisonment. The release date aligns with what would have been Shakur’s 46th birthday.
47 Meters Down is opening to $11.5 million from 2,270 locations. It’s the first major release from Entertainment Studios, which acquired the project from its original distributor, Dimension Films. Mandy Moore and Claire Holt star as sisters who decide to go cage diving, and end up at risk of being attacked by sharks.
Finally, Rough Night, a raunchy, fem-centric R-rated comedy from Sony (SNE), is on track to earn only $8.1 million from 3,162 locations. The project combines the talents of director and co-writer Lucia Aniello, co-writer and actor Paul W. Downs, and star Ilana Glazer—the three are frequent collaborators on Comedy Central’s Broad City and Time Traveling Bong. Scarlett Johansson, Kate McKinnon, Jillian Bell, Zoe Kravitz, and Glazer make up a rowdy girl gang who reunite for a bachelorette weekend that goes horribly wrong.
“It is genuinely a funny movie that was made at the right price, and there is a place for Rough Night as summer counter-programming in the coming weeks,” said Sony’s distribution chief Adrian Smith.
Rough Night will land in seventh for the weekend behind its fellow newcomers, Wonder Woman, the second weekend of The Mummy ($13.9 million) and Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales ($8.5 million).
