‘Despicable Me 3’ Gru-vier With $99M Weekend; $160M Overseas Through Wednesday – International Box Office
Universal/Illumination
UPDATE, THURSDAY AM: When the dust settled following the July 4 holiday, Illumination/Universal’s leader, Despicable Me 3, ticked a touch higher at the international box office — to $98.8M through the weekend in 52 markets. Adding in Monday through Wednesday figures, the overseas gross is $159.6M for $266.6M worldwide. Further Uni actuals have been updated below.
UPDATE, TUESDAY AM writethru with actuals: Because of the July 4 holiday in the U.S., some actuals reporting is delayed. However, across the films that have been updated, there were increases for several of the major titles filing through offshore turnstiles. Illumination/Universal’s weekend leader, Despicable Me 3, snatched the top spot at the international box office with a better-than-estimated $98.1M through Sunday from 52 markets (including previews). That’s up $2.5M from the Sunday figure and lifts the offshore cume to $119.5M after early rollout began in six markets two weeks back.
Combined with domestic, the global total for the weekend is $191.9M. Including Monday’s North American estimate, DM3 has crossed $200M worldwide with a significant handful of majors still ahead.
Gru and his long-lost twin brother Dru made off with No. 1s in 44 out of 46 new opening plays at the weekend, and handily topped the 2nd frame of last week’s leader, Transformers: The Last Knight. That film saw a 65% drop for a slightly higher than projected $69.8M weekend in 44 hubs. By comparison, Transformers: Age Of Extinction dipped a little over 52% from its opening in 2014 to its sophomore session. The current international cume on Michael Bay’s Paramount action fivequel is $329.6M.
Optimus Prime crossed $200M in China on Monday, per local reporting. That’s his lead market by far, although as we saw last week, T5 will not touch the record heights of its predecessor there with word of mouth dinging the robots’ armor and DM3 on its way into the Middle Kingdom on Friday. Last Knight did score No. 1s in the three new opening destinations of France, India and Belgium this frame. Among majors yet to come are Brazil, Mexico, Japan and Spain.
Turning back to DM3, the Kyle Balda/Pierre Coffin-helmed pic (reported production cost: high $70Ms) set new records in several markets for the biggest opening weekend ever for an animated film; top Illumination bows of all time; and best of the franchise.
The lead hub to start is the UK with $14.7M at No. 1 including a record-setting Saturday for an animated title. Overall, DM3 is running well ahead of its brethren, all except Minions which, in like-for-like markets and at today’s exchange rates was at $140M at this point in release. DM2 was at $99M vs DM3’s $119.5M. The UK and China have typically led markets for the franchise. This one lands in the latter on July 7 with a fair bit of runway ahead. (NB: Uni will provide updated full-market breakdowns on Wednesday.)
Also notable this weekend, Warner Bros/DC’s Wonder Woman powered past the $700M worldwide box office threshold with a bigger $709.6M than was estimated Sunday. The Amazon warrior held well in her 5th frame, and has lassoed $363.4M overseas with Japan still on deck. Brazil has continued to be a strength for Diana Prince.
Disney’s Pirates Of The Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales also crossed $700M globally, aided by a strong two-day debut in Japan which is typically a huge market for the series. Through July 2, the film reeled in $710.6M worldwide, including $545M international — up from the Sunday call. That lifts the Pirates franchise to over $4.4B worldwide.
In debuts, Sony’s Stateside breakout Baby Driver sped off to a $6.8M start internationally, with the UK the only major play. The Edgar Wright-helmed pic will see a long summer rollout.
Elsewhere, Sony has another new kid in town beginning Wednesday this week as Spider-Man: Homecoming starts day-and-date release in North America and offshore plays including the UK, Korea, Russia and Brazil. Hot on the webslinger’s heels, Fox’s War For The Planet Of The Apes starts swinging July 11. Both have been very well-reviewed thus far and will mark some big territory over the first half of the month.
Neither of those is set to hit China imminently where Transformers, as noted, will slow further this week ahead of DM3’s entrance. The first movie in that franchise never released there, but the Middle Kingdom was No. 2 behind the UK on both DM2 and Minions. Execs agree that it’s still unclear if there is a full black-out period ahead there — DM3 is the last Hollywood movie currently dated. This frame saw two Chinese movies enter the Top 10 international (Reset and Wished — see more in the Local-Language section below) while there are any number of new homegrown titles gearing up for release.
Breakdowns have been updated below for the films that have reported (Baby Driver is notably among the non-updated pics).
NEW
BABY DRIVER
The cast and director had their international premiere in Leicester Square with a 3-day junket last week, bookended by stops in Paris and Madrid. Wright has been active on Twitter all week and was given high praise by fan/director Guillermo del Toro in a 13-strong tweet endorsement. The UK start is 32% bigger than Now You See Me, which Sony is using as a main comp.
Over the same territories that opened this frame, including Holland, the launch is 13% ahead of Now You See Me.
Sony showed extended footage of the Ansel Elgort-starrer to European exhibitors at CineEurope in Barcelona last month where excitement was palpable. It had previously premiered the film at SXSW where it won the Audience Award.
Baby Driver has a long summer rollout ahead of it with Spain opening this coming weekend, followed by Australia, France, Brazil, Germany, Mexico and Russia.
THE HOUSE
HOLDOVERS/EXPANSIONS
DESPICABLE ME 3
DM3 is running well ahead of the previous installments, but 15% lower than Minions at the same point of release in like-for-like markets and at today’s exchange rates. While spinoff Minions is a fair comp, it’s not apples-to-apples given the storyline focus for the DMs is on Steve Carell’s Gru; these films also play older than Minions, an out-and-out phenomenon two years ago whose own sequel is due in 2020.
Drilling down into this weekend’s DM3 performance, it was No. 1 in 44 of 46 new plays. In Australia’s 3rd weekend, it recaptured the top spot from Transformers 5. The launch was the biggest animated movie opening weekend of all time in Argentina, Brazil, Egypt, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, the Netherlands, Ukraine, Venezuela and the Middle East. In addition, Estonia’s opening of $294K and Latvia’s opening of $247K are the biggest opening weekends for all films ever.
DM3 also scored the biggest opening weekend for Illumination in the above markets as well as Finland, Peru, Poland, Sweden, the UAE and Uruguay. Of the franchise films, including Minions, this one was tops in the above along with Denmark, India and Israel.
In Sunday estimates, the UK, $14.7M was worth 56% market share — the Saturday was the biggest opening Saturday ever for an animated film. Also No. 1 in Mexico with 74% market share, the weekend estimate is $13.5M for the 2nd biggest opening weekend for an animated film, behind Minions. Brazil bowed at No. 1 with $7.5M and 63% market share. Russia opened No. 1 with $9.2M and 68% market share. Spain started strong at No. 1 with $5.5M and 58% market share — the 2nd best Illumination launch ever. At $4.4M, DM3 in Argentina is the market’s 3rd biggest opening of all films, behind only Fast & Furious 7 and 8.
The UK and China have typically led markets for the franchise, although the initial DM movie did not release in the latter. This one lands there on July 7 with a fair bit of runway ahead of it as the last Hollywood movie that’s thus far been dated during what is typically a blackout period.
TRANSFORMERS: THE LAST KNIGHT
In holds, China led at $29.5M from 7,000 locations over the weekend. That lifted the estimated total there to $193.5M after 10 days. The film dropped 76% in the Middle Kingdom (it had already seen a bigger than expected Saturday to Sunday drop last session and has suffered poor word of mouth). While unofficial, estimates out of China through Monday have it crossing $200M. Still, it will not reach the hoped for heights of its predecessor, Age Of Extinction, which set a new record there in 2014. That film played into the (unofficial) July blackout and became the biggest import ever (at the time) after 12 days of release. It’s not clear if the temporary moratorium on outside pics is being fully enforced by the PROC this year. Currently Despicable Me 3 is the last Hollywood film slated for a while.
Elsewhere, the best hold was in Germany which added $3.6M for a local cume of $9.7M. In Korea, Bumblebee got stung by local pic Anarchist From Colony to land at No. 2 for the sophomore session with $3M/$17.6M cume (2nd best overseas market). Russia added $2.1M for $13.1M to date and the UK toyed with another $2.1M for a $10.2M cume.
In South East Asia, Malaysia leads with $7.2M to date. Taiwan is at $5.8M. There are still major markets to release including Brazil and Mexico in two weeks and Japan and Spain in early August.
PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN: DEAD MEN TELL NO TALES
POTC5 is The Walt Disney Studios’ 3rd release of 2017 to reach the $700M global milestone and the 4th Pirates film to do so.
WONDER WOMAN
Holds were tight in Brazil (-31%/$29.9M cume), France (+2%/$13.2M cume), Australia (-16%/$19.8M cume) and Germany (-4%$7M cume). The UK’s 5th session was worth $1.2M for $26.3M thus far.
The lead market is China at $88.5M, followed by Brazil, the UK, Mexico ($22M) and Australia. In the Philippines, the Amazon warrior’s $10.5M is the biggest score for a WB movie ever. Japan is last to bow on August 25.
THE MUMMY
BAYWATCH
CARS 3
MISC UPDATED CUMES/NOTABLE
Diary Of A Wimpy Kid: The Long Haul (FOX): $2.1M intl weekend (10 markets); $13M intl cume
Beauty And The Beast (DIS): $1M intl weekend (6 markets); $755.8M intl cume of which $108.5M is from Japan
Everything, Everything (WB): $2M intl weekend (33 markets); $12.2M intl cume
Alien: Covenant (FOX): $832K intl weekend (9 markets); $157.8M intl cume
*The Beguiled (UNI): $421K intl weekend (3 markets); 2nd biggest start for a Sofia Coppola movie in Germany at $307K on 116 screens; $504K intl cume through Tuesday
Captain Underpants: The First Epic Movie (FOX): $358K intl weekend (5 markets); $7.4M intl cume
* Denotes new
LOCAL-LANGUAGE
Three Asian films landed in the Top 10 internationally this weekend.
In China, Reset opened at No. 2 behind Transformers with $13.7M. Exec produced by Jackie Chan, the sci-fi action pic sees a woman team up with the inventor of a time machine to attempt to rescue her kidnapped son. Mi Yang stars. Yoon Hong-Seung directs.
In Korea, Lee Joon-ik’s Anarchist From Colony stars Lee Je-hoon and grossed $6.7M. The period biopic takes place during Korea’s time under Japanese rule. It’s centered on Park Yeol, founder of the Heukdohwe anarchist group during the Colonial Era, which sought to assassinate Japan’s Crown Prince.
(Also, in Korea Okja debuted on 103 screens this weekend, despite blowback from the local exhibition community over the Netflix title also going to streaming. It grossed $739K at No. 4.)
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