‘The Meg’ In Too Deep? | Box Office Report 10-12th August 2018
The big news coming out of the UK box office this week is the success of The Meg, which took a huge bite out of the takings for its high earning competition to land at number 1 in its debut weekend. It seems that silly action movies starring Jason Statham truly can swim with sharks…
Here are the top 5 films of the weekend 10-12th August 2018:
Overall, the top 6 films at the UK box office this past weekend accounted for around £15.5million of the UK cinema goers’ money, with The Meg managing to only just pip Mamma Mia 2 to the post as the highest grossing film on release with a total accumulation of £3,651,111.
In a dog eat dog (or should that be shark eat shark) summer environment where all of the top 5 movies were separated by just £1.5million and made over £2million each, The Meg may have the bragging rights of toppling such stiff competition but its opening hasn’t exactly been the hot chip Warner Bros. would have liked it to be.
The movie, produced for around $130million (according to Warner Bros.) and promoted with what is thought to be a further $100-120million, actually only just broke Warner Bros’ annual top 5 openings list, even being outperformed here in the UK by the incredibly underwhelming Rampage. Here are the 5 highest grossing Warner Bros. openings at the UK box office in 2018:
- Ready Player One – £5.1million
- Ocean’s 8 – £4.3million
- Rampage – £4.1million
- The Meg – £3.7million
- Tomb Raider – £3.1million
The story in North America is somewhat contrary to that of its UK release however, with the film opening at double its projections of $22-23million to earn an impressive $45million in its opening weekend, earning itself the title of Warner Bros’ hottest opener in 2018 thus far in the region. The movie also earned around $55million in China, a market the film was specifically produced to appeal to via a production deal with a Chinese company.
Experts seem to believe that the movie will have to hit $400million to break even, a figure that still seems unlikely despite the movie’s strong start across the globe, so we’ll keep our eyes peeled for developments as regards its success and therefore the possibility of a sequel.
At number 2 in the UK box office chart this week is Mamma Mia: Here We Go Again! which dropped just 12% between its 3rd and 4th weekends to earn £3,568,169 Friday to Sunday and push its overall total to £48,311,304. This figure, which continues to track ahead of the original movie – itself a former top 10 record high grosser when it was released – makes the Mamma Mia sequel the 3rd highest grossing movie of 2018 thus far, with the Abba-centred musical likely to surpass Marvel juggernaut Black Panther (£50million) for the number 2 spot any day now.
Meanwhile, this week’s number 3 release Incredibles 2 has just become the most successful Disney Pixar movie of all time, hitting $1.088billion worldwide to out-gross both Finding Dory and Toy Story 3 which each raked in huge amounts for the animation powerhouse. Here in the UK it is doing sensationally well too, reaching £45,007,302 thus far to earn itself the title of 4th highest grossing movie of 2018.
Just like Mamma Mia 2, Incredibles 2 seems to have the legs to out-gross Black Panther in the UK market, making an end of year top 5 spot almost guaranteed and sending it into 2019 as the 2nd highest grossing superhero film of the year.
And while we’re on the topic of superhero films…
Ant-Man and The Wasp fell quite drastically this weekend from a £5million opening to just £2.2million in its 2nd weekend, perhaps validating the commentary surrounding the film’s underwhelming performance in North America (which saw it gross less money than Ant-Man 1) that the film wasn’t closely enough linked to the central Avengers story. It remains likely that Ant-Man 2 will be the first sequel in Marvel Studios history to not out-gross the first movie in its own franchise here in the UK, with its £10,493,740 gross to date making the £16.5million gross of the first movie seeming further and further away given the level of competition currently in play.
In contrast to that news, Mission: Impossible – Fallout remains on course to beat the £20million total accumulation of Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation to become the MI franchise’s highest grossing release of all time here in the UK, earning a further £2,042,327 this weekend to take its overall total to £17,455,734.
In North America, the 6th Mission: Impossible instalment is all-but guaranteed to become the franchise’s highest grosser ever and the film may become the highest grossing of the franchise worldwide even before being released in China at the end of the month (a market it is expected to perform well in due to the pull of Tom Cruise).
Fallout is currently the 9th highest grossing movie of 2018 in the North American market.
Here are the 15 highest grossing movies at the UK box office for the weekend of 10-12th August 2018:
- The Meg – weeks on release: 1 – weekend: £3,651,111 – total: £3,651,111
- Mamma Mia: Here We Go Again! – 4 – £3,568,169 – £48,311,304
- Incredibles 2 – 5 – £2,354,530 – £45,007,302
- Ant-Man and The Wasp – 2 – £2,282,343 – £10,493,740
- Mission: Impossible – Fallout – 3 – £2,042,327 – £17,455,734
- Hotel Transylvania 3: A Monster Vacation – 3 – £1,565,618 – £11,249,963
- The Darkest Minds – 1 – £388,325 – £388,325
- Teen Titans Go! To the Movies – 2 – £246,390 – £1,013,117
- Unfriended: Dark Web – 1 – £223,110 – £223,110
- The First Purge – 6 – £117,451 – £5,776,741
- Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom – 10 – £102,957 – £41,281,227
- Vishwaroopam 2 – 1 – £61,771 – £61,771
- Dog Days – 1 – £59,223 – £59,223
- Ocean’s 8 – 8 – £47,159 – £11,029,049
- Heathers (re-release) – 1 – £43,462 – £43,462
Outside of the top 5 there were underwhelming debuts for The Darkest Minds and Unfriended: Dark Web which both gambled with late summer releases and lost, earning £388,325 and £223,110 respectively, to make even the £1million barrier seem an unlikely target at this stage. This will be particularly concerning for Fox and Darkest Minds as the picture has thus far only managed to earn $22million worldwide from a budget of $34million, making the possibility of profitability slim to none. Meanwhile, Unfriended: Dark Web has already earned 10 times its budget of just $1million at the worldwide box office, all but guaranteeing a third movie in the Unfriended franchise.
The stacked cast of Dog Days couldn’t lift the movie into the top 10 in its debut weekend, earning just £59,223 to make a 2nd weekend in most UK cinemas unlikely, while the re-release of Heathers this weekend couldn’t even make it to £50,000 though the actual anniversary of its release is mid-week and therefore may boost its numbers ahead of next weekend. Either way, it’s set to make significantly less than the re-release of fellow cult classic Blade Runner, which earned over £2million across its re-release earlier in the year.
And finally, Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom officially passed Peter Rabbit on the annual top 5 highest grossing movies list this weekend but was simultaneously surpassed by both Mamma Mia 2 and Incredibles 2, leaving Fallen Kingdom at number 4 on the annual list as of today, a slot lower than it was this time last week.
And that about does it for this week’s box office report. This coming weekend the UK box office welcomes Disney’s Christopher Robin and The Equaliser 2 to cinemas, each with aims of dethroning at the highly compact top 5 movies from this week and pushing to the top of the charts. With each of these films having already been released in North America, there are lots of facts to go over so make sure to bookmark our homepage, follow us on Twitter and like us on Facebook to make sure you don’t miss out on next week’s report. As always, you can access our top 5 chart video before anyone else by subscribing to us on YouTube. If you have any suggestions on what you’d like to see included in next week’s report, please do leave a comment below.
