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Last night at the world premiere of Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse there was a huge sigh of relief from the mass of animators inside Westwood’s Regency Village Theater: the $100M budgeted sequel to the Oscar winning animated movie, Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, was done; having completed post-production literally just ten days ago after a five-year trek to the screen which included a Covid delay due to the backlog in post-production houses. Starting today abroad, and into tomorrow in U.S./Canada, the continuing adventures of Miles Morales will see the light of day in what is expected to be a $150M global opening.
Overseas that’s a projected $60M opening, including $20M from China –which loves Spider-Man (the first animated pic grossed over $62M there)— as well as Belgium, France, Netherlands today; Australia, Brazil, Germany, Italy, Mexico, UK tomorrow, and Spain and the PRC on Friday. The first installment in like-for-like markets and at today’s rates including China opened to $49M. In the U.S. at 4,200 theaters including Imax and PLF, the industry projection for the 2 hour and 20 minute animated sequel stands at $80M-$90M over Friday to Sunday.
The first movie, which opened in mid December 2018 to $35.3M U.S. and finaled at $190.2M, drew a majority of guys at 67% with solid diversity turnout of 21% Hispanic and Latino moviegoers, 16% Black and 15% Asian. Those demos are expected to return starting tomorrow at 2PM when previews start at 3,500 locations. Given the fanboy laden nature of the franchise, it’s not expected to damage the momentum of Disney’s Little Mermaid in weekend 2 which is expected to be around $40M, -58%.
Spider-Man: Across the Spider-verse swings into Japan, another prime territory for the superhero, on June 16 while South Korea will see the sequel on June 21. At CinemaCon 2022, Sony showed off the first 15 minutes of the movie. This despite the fact that the sequel was pushed from Oct. 7 last year to this weekend. Why the wait? Filmmakers Joaquim Dos Santos, Kemp Powers and Justin K. Thompson were looking to take the pic’s avant garde animation style to a whole other level from the first installment.
In the wake of Legendary/Screen Gems’ The Machine, Lionsgate’s About My Father and Briarcliff’s Kandahar falling to the wayside over the four day holiday weekend with middling single digit debuts, it would seem smaller movies are officially dead. Not so, if you’re a horror movie — you’re very much alive, and that’s certainly the case with Disney/20th Century Studios’ Hulu-to-theatrical pivot, The Boogeyman which is expected to do around $15M, give or take at 3,000 theaters. Previews start at 7PM Thursday. Young women 17-34, who are not going to Across the Spider-verse, are the sweet spot for this PG-13 Rob Savage directed, feature take of the 1973 Stephen King short story.
In the pic, high school student Sadie Harper (Sophie Thatcher) and her little sister Sawyer (Obi-Wan Kenobi‘s little Princess Leia, Viven Lyra Blair) are still reeling from the recent death of their mother. Devastated by his own pain, their father Will (Chris Messina), a therapist by profession, gives them neither the support nor the affection that they try to claim from him. When a desperate patient shows up unexpectedly at their house asking for help, they bring in a terrifying entity that preys on the family and feeds on their greatest suffering.
Disney tested the movie from producers Shawn Levy, Dan Cohen and Dan Levine and determined it was ripe for the big screen.
How’s the summer box office doing?
According to ComScore, for the period of May 5-29 it’s $716.2M so far, -3% from the same period a year ago.