The good news for Birds of Prey is that the Margot Robbie led comic book adaptation finished number one at the box office. The bad news is that the film came in nearly $20 million below projected tracking and now everyone is scratching their heads trying to figure out what went wrong.
Birds of Prey grossed a muted $33 million at the weekend box office. You have to go back to the DC adaptation of Jonah Hex to find a lower DC opening weekend and while Birds of Prey is nowhere near the $5.3 million opening weekend flop of that film, it’s nowhere near some of the recent DC adaptations. All signs pointed to success over the weekend with the film generating solid reviews (81% fresh on Rotten Tomatoes as it headed into the weekend) and early test screening responses were overwhelmingly positive, which should’ve boosted interest. There is some speculation as to what went wrong and they range from the title not really indicating this is Harley Quinn’s movie, which has resulted in a sudden name change that we reported here. Another theory is that some moviegoers are holding out for their trip to the theater this weekend as Valentine’s Day falls on a Friday and it’s traditionally a big date night option. This theory could hold some weight but Birds of Prey had this whole weekend to itself and with Valentine’s Day, it has added competition with the releases of Sonic The Hedgehog, Fantasy Island, and The Photograph.
The real culprit here may be the R-rating and given the exit polling for the film, this theory may hold some weight. Birds of Prey scored a respectable “B+” CinemaScore from opening day moviegoers from a crowd that was 51% female with 65% of the audience coming in aged 25 or older. The film scored best with younger audiences (aged 13-17) as they gave the film an “A-” CinemaScore but they only made up 9% of the audience this weekend. It appears that the crowd that loved it the most, weren’t really allowed to see it due to the rating and if they did see it, they likely snuck in or purchased tickets for other films before stealthy making their way into Birds of Prey. The R-rating didn’t hurt films such as Deadpool, Deadpool 2 or Logan but Birds of Prey is a totally different beast. Those three films skewed heavily male and earned their R-ratings based on high displays of violence while Birds of Prey earns its rating from numerous F-bombs rather than making the blood flow across the screen. Comparisons have been made to Deadpool in terms of tone and while that comparison rings true, Birds of Prey has an aesthetic that makes it appear to skew younger so perhaps PG-13 was the way to go here. Birds of Prey cost anywhere between $84-97 million to make so it doesn’t carry one of those hard to recoup budgets that plague most studio tentpoles. That being said, $100 million domestic is in question at this point and the film will have to look to overseas grosses to carry some of the load. Internationally, Birds of Prey debuted in 78 markets with an estimated $48 million.
Dropping to second is Bad Boys For Life which grossed $12 million. That’s a solid drop of just 32.1% as the film wasn’t really hurt by the arrival of Birds of Prey. The film has now grossed $166.3 million at the domestic box office and internationally, the film added another $15.8 million for an overseas gross totaling $170 million and a worldwide tally now reaching $336 million.
Falling to third but seeing a slight 2.7% drop weekend-to-weekend due to sampling ahead of the Oscars last Sunday is 1917 which grossed $9.2 million. A lot of people, myself included, were expecting 1917 to win Best Picture and Director at Sunday’s ceremony but Parasite swept in and won those big prizes so this is likely the last weekend that 1917 sees such an impressive hold. That doesn’t make 1917 a slouch by any means as it has grossed $132.7 million at the domestic box office but the Oscar shine is off of this one so it will be interesting to see how the film holds up this weekend. Internationally, the film brought in over $15 million from markets currently in play, bringing the overseas total just shy of $155 million for a global performance now topping $287 million.
In fourth, we find Dolittle which also saw a great hold this weekend with a gross of $6.5 million. That’s a mere drop of just 13.9% which would be great news for the film had it not cost $175 million to make before even factoring in marketing spend. Dolittle has grossed $63.8 million to date domestically and internationally, the film opened in the UK and France this weekend, which helped generate nearly $19 million for the weekend, for an international gross that now stands at $94.7 million for a $158.7 million global total.
Rounding out the top five is Jumanji: The Next Level which spends a ninth week in the top five with a gross of $5.5 million. Jumanji sees another amazing hold, dropping just 7.4% weekend-to-weekend. Jumanji: The Next Level is just shy of $300 million domestically with a running total of $298.4 million. The sequel will likely get there as we head into business on Friday and internationally the film delivered an estimated $3.3 million this weekend from 58 markets still in play, taking the international gross to $470 million and the worldwide total to $768 million.
Check out the full top ten results below:
| Film | Total | % Change | Gross to Date |
|---|---|---|---|
| Onward | $10,601,952 | -72.9% | $60.3 |
| Bloodshot | $9,176,695 | NEW | $9.17 |
| I Still Believe | $9,103,614 | NEW | $9.10 |
| The Invisible Man | $5,890,805 | -61.1% | $64.3 |
| The Hunt | $5,304,455 | NEW | $5.3 |
| Sonic the Hedgehog | $2,522,584 | -67.3% | $145.7 |
| The Way Back | $2,356,115 | -71.2% | $13.3 |
| The Call of the Wild | $2,226,720 | -67.1% | $62 |
| Emma. | $1,295,215 | -73% | $9.9 |
| Bad Boys for Life | $1,102,208 | -63.5% | $204.2 |
