Encanto leads another quiet weekend at North American box office

Los Angeles

WITHOUT any new releases to pose a threat, Disney's animated musical fable Encanto has again notched the No 1 spot on the North American box office charts.

In its second weekend of release, Encanto collected US$12.38 million from 3,980 venues in the US and Canada. That marks a 54 per cent drop from its debut and pushes the film's 2-week total to US$57.6 million domestically.

A decline of roughly 50 per cent between its first and second weekend is in line with Disney's recent Thanksgiving releases, such as 2016's Moana (down 50 per cent); 2017's Coco (down only 45 per cent); 2018's Ralph Breaks the Internet (down 54 per cent); and 2019's Frozen II (down 59 per cent).

Prior Disney animated features were able to conjure stronger starts at the domestic box office, however, those films were not playing in theatres during a pandemic.

By Covid-19 standards, Encanto is faring well at the box office.

The family-friendly adventure, which boasts songs by Hamilton creator Lin-Manuel Miranda, will land on Disney+ after playing exclusively in cinemas for 30 days.

Other than Encanto and its fellow holdover titles, like MGM's starry crime drama House of Gucci and Sony's Ghostbusters: Afterlife reboot, it is all quiet on the box office front.

That is, until Steven Spielberg's marvellously received West Side Story adaptation lands in theatres on Dec 10 and Tom Holland's comic book adventure Spider-Man: No Way Home hits the big screen on Dec 17.

Although big-budget films have started to return to cinemas and Covid-19 vaccines have been approved for younger children, movie theatre attendance has remained on the lighter side.

Still, Hollywood studios and film exhibitors have been optimistic that Spielberg's latest, Spidey's finale and Neo's return in The Matrix: Resurrections on Dec 22 will be a potent enough combination to boost ticket sales in December.

Until then, cinema operators will be serving up the leftovers.

The North American box office chart's standings are near identical to last weekend's results, with Ghostbusters: Afterlife in second place, House of Gucci at No 3 and Marvel's comic book epic Eternals in fifth.

Fourth spot was won by Fathom Events' Christmas with The Chosen: The Messengers. The release is a holiday special of the religious streaming series The Chosen and recounts the birth and life of Jesus Christ. The Messengers is projected to earn US$4 million over the 3-day weekend.

Fathom Events sold US$1.5 million in pre-sales during its first 12 hours of availability, prompting an expansion to a 10-night run across 1,700 theaters, the largest in the history of the specialty distributor.

Afterlife, in its third weekend of release, collected US$10.35 million from 4,059 North American theaters. In a notable pandemic-era milestone, the film - available only in cinemas - surpassed the US$100 million mark domestically on Sunday (Dec 5).

Elsewhere, Lady Gaga continues to prop up the movie theater business. Her latest film House of Gucci added US$6.77 million from 3,477 locations in the US and Canada.

After debuting to US$21 million over the extended Thanksgiving holiday weekend, House of Gucci has boosted its domestic tally to US$33.6 million, which is not a bad result at a time when most adult dramas during the pandemic have struggled to reach US$10 million in total.

But decent box office receipts by Covid-19 standards may not be enough to ensure House of Gucci becomes profitable.

Since it cost US$75 million to produce and many millions more to advertise, House of Gucci will need international audiences to turn out in force to get the movie out of the red.

After 5 weeks in theatres, Eternals brought in US$3.8 million from 3,230 cinemas this weekend.

The comic book adaptation - starring Gemma Chan, Richard Madden, Kumail Nanjiani, Salma Hayek and Angelina Jolie - has amassed US$156 million at the domestic box office - an impressive number, albeit one that is a little beneath Marvel's usual sky-high performances.

Also notable is Warner Bros and Legendary's Dune, which returned to Imax screens over the weekend for a final dance with premium formats at the tail end of its theatrical run.

The Denis Villeneuve-helmed sci-fi epic experienced a measly drop of 16 per cent from the Thanksgiving holiday. REUTERS