Box Office: ‘Deadpool & Wolverine’ Back on Top as ‘Blink Twice’ Underwhelms and ‘The Crow’ Collapses
New players at the late summer box office struggled to find their footing as the high season winds down.
Holdovers Deadpool & Wolverine, Alien: Romulus and It Ends With Us easily beat new offerings on the August marquee, including suspense thriller Blink Twice and The Crow reboot.
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Marking Zo? Kravitz’s directorial debut and starring Channing Tatum, Blink Twice opened in fourth place with $7.3 million, the low end of expectations, after receiving a B- CinemaScore from audiences (conversely, it earned relatively strong reviews). The film is from MGM and Amazon, with Warner Bros. handling overseas.
Blink Twice reportedly cost a modest $20 million to produce before marketing, so doesn’t appear to be in financial peril.
The story follows tech billionaire Slater King (Tatum), who invites cocktail waitress Frida (Naomi Ackie) to join him and his friends on a dream vacation on his private island. Wild nights blend into sun-soaked days, and everyone’s having a great time. No one wants this trip to end, but as strange things start to happen, Frida begins to question her reality and becomes convinced something is amiss.
The Crow — opening 30 years after the original hit the big screen — couldn’t crack the top five and instead placed No. 8 with $4.6 million behind the 15th anniversary celebration of Coraline, which grossed $5.1 million.
Distributed by Lionsgate, The Crow‘s budget is a reported $50 million before marketing. Bill Skarsgard takes on the titular role in this modern-day reimagining of the original graphic novel by James O’Barr. The Crow likewise received a B- CinemaScore but, unlike Blink Twice, was rebuffed by reviewers.
The only new film to receive a glowing recommendation from audiences was faith-based The Forge, which looks to round out the top five with an estimated $6 million-plus after receiving a glowing A+ CinemaScore.
Marvel Studios and Disney’s Deadpool & Wolverine reclaimed the top spot in its fifth weekend with a hearty $18.3 million for a domestic tally approaching $580 million and $1.221 billion after briefly relinquishing the crown last weekend to 20th Century and Disney’s Alien: Romulus, which fell to second place in its sophomore outing with an estimated $16.2 million, a 61 percent decline. The pic has a chance at finally reviving the storied franchise with global earnings in the $225 million range.
Sony’s female-skewing It Ends With Us, starring Blake Lively, continues to impress and came in third place with an impressive $11.9 million domestically for a North American tally of $120.8 million and $242.6 million globally to beat the entire lifetime runs of such female-skewing pics as Anyone but You.
The Kendrick brothers directed The Forge for Sony and its faith-based label Affirm. The movie debuted in fifth place with $6.6 million.
Universal’s Twisters came in sixth place with $6.2 million for a domestic tally of nearly $250 million.
Aug. 25, 9 a.m.: Updated with revised numbers.
This story was originally published Aug. 24.
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