KINGDOM OF THE PLANET OF THE APES opening | NOT ANOTHER CHURCH MOVIE opening | International box office update | May 10 to 12, 2024 weekend
Opening weekend box office, charts and commentary
The current weekend: May 10 to 12, 2024
1) Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes opening
- This is an excellent opening for the 10th episode in an action series. The weekend figure is roughly average for the genre, but average here is based on the biggest action films of all time. This is a strong hold compared with the previous movie's start.
The last four Planet of the Apes have been extremely well-reviewed, and reviews are very good now. These movies' particular strength is overseas. The foreign numbers are excellent, aside from a decline in China (see section below):
- The series began in 1968 and generated five films between 1968 and 1973. It returned for a remake directed by Tim Burton and starring Mark Wahlberg in 2001, and there have been four big sequels since 2011. Any story that generates 10 episodes over 56 years at this level is in elite company.
2) Not Another Church Movie opening
- This release starring Jamie Foxx, Mickey Rourke and Kevin Daniels is opening on a limited number of screens (1,108), with no marketing support, so comparisons with the averages below are not going to be favorable. The Rotten Tomatoes review score is poor:
Rotten Tomatoes scores for Black American comedies
- The average RT score for Black American comedies is 12 points lower than for non-Black comedies:
In general, Black American stories face greater expectations than other stories. Is this film accurate? Was that a joke or a statement? That’s a stereotype. Who's qualified to tell this story? This story, again? Et cetera.
The result is negative Rotten Tomatoes scores. We don’t agree with that assessment, but that’s the verdict from the scores.
3) International box office update
- Since the start of the pandemic, the share of foreign box office for Hollywood movies has declined by -2.6 percentage points. Most of that drop has come from two types of films: action and family. And most of the decline has come from the Chinese market, where up to five years ago, those pictures did enormous business.
Character-driven titles have maintained the same balance of foreign business — again, we’re talking about the share of foreign vs. domestic box office:
- The decline of the Chinese market for American movies is a familiar story now. Chinese creative and production skills have improved, and over the years the Chinese government has obstructed access to American movies with trade barriers and more recently with propaganda in support of Chinese films and critical of American movies.
But while that was happening, a number of overseas markets have grown, and they're replacing a lot of the lost revenue. Those markets include Mexico, So. Korea, India, Indonesia, the UAE and Saudi Arabia, et al. For instance, Super Mario Bros. recently made an eye-popping $85.4m in Mexico, vs. $24.9 in China.
The Nun 2, $183.2m of foreign BO, or 68% of its worldwide total, with zero from China, in September 2023 Still, China's absence is felt for a big action pic like Planet of the Apes — the previous film finished with $112m there, and this one will do a fraction of that. The decline is softened by the fact that foreign distributors collect only 25% of the BO in China, versus 50% elsewhere, but it’s a loss nonetheless.
Overall
- As good as the Planet of the Apes opening is, it's not quite an over-performance. That's what the industry is waiting for — something to jolt the market and electrify summer moviegoing.