Box Office

Thor hammers all the competition

Mark Ruffalo (left) stars as the Hulk and Chris Hemsworth is Thor in Thor: Ragnarok, the third installment of the popular Marvel movie franchise. It came in first at last weekend’s box office and made about $122.7 million.
Mark Ruffalo (left) stars as the Hulk and Chris Hemsworth is Thor in Thor: Ragnarok, the third installment of the popular Marvel movie franchise. It came in first at last weekend’s box office and made about $122.7 million.

LOS ANGELES -- After a slow October, the premiere of Marvel Studios' Thor: Ragnarok reignited the box office like a clap of thunder.

Disney's big-budget action fantasy brought in an estimated $122.7 million in U.S. and Canadian theaters, above analysts' expectations.

The third installment in the standalone Thor franchise, Thor: Ragnarok had the biggest debut yet, with the seventh-biggest November opening ever and the fourth-best opening of 2017 thus far. The original Thor, released by Paramount from Marvel in 2011, premiered with $65 million, and 2013's Thor: The Dark World debuted to $85 million before grossing $645 million worldwide.

The newest entry, starring Chris Hemsworth as the Norse god and directed by New Zealand filmmaker Taika Waititi, has a 93 percent "fresh" rating from review aggregation site Rotten Tomatoes and an A-rating on audience polling service CinemaScore. New to big-budget blockbusters, Waititi is a veteran of the indie scene with films like What We Do in the Shadows and Hunt for the Wilderpeople.

STX Entertainment's A Bad Moms Christmas, which opened Nov. 1, debuted at No. 2.

The R-rated comedy sequel, a follow-up to the 2016 sleeper hit about three mothers who buck the unreasonable expectations of society and their families, grossed $17 million over the weekend and $21.3 million through Sunday, just under analysts' expectations of $25 million.

The original film starring Mila Kunis, Kathryn Hahn and Kristen Bell opened with $24 million before grossing $113 million domestically. The sequel, which cost $28 million to make, introduces Cheryl Hines, Christine Baranski and Susan Sarandon as the main characters' mothers.

STX is trying to turn the early success of Bad Moms into a full-blown franchise, with a Bad Dads spinoff already in the works.

Coming in third was Lionsgate's Jigsaw which earned $6.5 million over the weekend, a 60 percent drop since last week, for a cumulative gross of $28.8 million.

The eighth installment in the popular Saw franchise, the R-rated Jigsaw follows, in reviewer Noel Murray's words, "bad folks stuck in an elaborate torture chamber" and earned an average B rating from CinemaScore and a 31 percent "rotten" rating on Rotten Tomatoes.

Directed by Michael and Peter Spierig, the film comes seven years after Saw VII: The Final Chapter, once intended to wrap the franchise, and 13 years after the first Saw film.

Boo 2! A Madea Halloween, also by Lionsgate, came in fourth with $4.5 million last weekend, a 54 percent decline. The film has a cumulative total of $43 million.

Now in its third week, Boo 2! garnered mixed reviews from audiences and critics, earning an A-minus rating on CinemaScore and a dismal 6 percent "rotten" rating on Rotten Tomatoes.

Rounding out the top five was Warner Bros.' environmental disaster thriller Geostorm, also in its third week. It brought in an additional $3.2 million, a 49 percent drop since opening, giving it a total of about $29 million.

The faith-based drama Let There Be Light from Atlas Distribution entered the top 10 in its second weekend of release. The film brough it $1.7 million and added 269 engagements for a total of 642 theaters nationwide but declined 6 percent from its opening weekend. Starring Kevin Sorbo and produced by Fox News' Sean Hannity, it earned an 84 percent "fresh" rating on Rotten Tomatoes.

In limited release, Vertical Entertainment's LBJ opened in 659 theaters with $1.1 million. Directed by Rob Reiner and starring Woody Harrelson as the 36th president of the United States, the film earned a 51 percent "rotten" rating on Rotten Tomatoes.

This week, Paramount opens the comedy sequel Daddy's Home 2, and Fox premieres the remake of Murder on the Orient Express. In limited release, Fox Searchlight debuts the dark comedy Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri.

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

The top 20 movies at U.S. and Canadian theaters Friday through Sunday (A Bad Moms Christmas opened Nov. 1), followed by distribution studio, gross, number of theater locations, average receipts per location, total gross and number of weeks in release, as compiled Monday by comScore:

  1. Thor: Ragnarok, Disney, $122,744,989, 4,080 locations, $30,085 average, $122,744,989, 1 Week.

  2. A Bad Moms Christmas, STX Entertainment, $16,759,161, 3,615 locations, $4,636 average, $21,285,267, 1 Week.

  3. Jigsaw, Lionsgate, $6,558,146, 2,941 locations, $2,230 average, $28,694,617, 2 Weeks.

  4. Boo 2! A Madea Halloween, Lionsgate, $4,541,190, 2,202 locations, $2,062 average, $42,849,613, 3 Weeks.

  5. Geostorm, Warner Bros., $3,194,031, 2,666 locations, $1,198 average, $28,929,372, 3 Weeks.

  6. Happy Death Day, Universal, $2,699,715, 2,184 locations, $1,236 average, $52,853,220, 4 Weeks.

  7. Blade Runner 2049, Warner Bros., $2,321,372, 1,464 locations, $1,586 average, $85,542,502, 5 Weeks.

  8. Thank You For Your Service, Universal, $2,207,855, 2,083 locations, $1,060 average, $7,302,585, 2 Weeks.

  9. Only The Brave, Sony, $1,920,075, 2,073 locations, $926 average, $15,300,542, 3 Weeks.

  10. Let There Be Light, Atlas Distribution Company, $1,697,448, 642 locations, $2,644 average, $4,089,804, 2 Weeks.

  11. The Foreigner, STX Entertainment, $1,596,414, 1,456 locations, $1,096 average, $31,994,397, 4 Weeks.

  12. Victoria And Abdul, Focus Features, $1,206,935, 796 locations, $1,516 average, $19,861,654, 7 Weeks.

  13. Suburbicon, Paramount, $1,185,036, 2,046 locations, $579 average, $5,081,606, 2 Weeks.

  14. LBJ, Vertical Entertainment, $1,110,565, 659 locations, $1,685 average, $1,110,565, 1 Week.

  15. It, Warner Bros., $1,001,288, 1,081 locations, $926 average, $325,879,722, 9 Weeks.

  16. Kingsman: The Golden Circle, 20th Century Fox, $818,414, 802 locations, $1,020 average, $98,682,466, 7 Weeks.

  17. American Made, Universal, $799,595, 663 locations, $1,206 average, $49,979,430, 6 Weeks.

  18. Lego Ninjago Movie, Warner Bros., $793,007, 835 locations, $950 average, $57,511,830, 7 Weeks.

  19. The Florida Project, A24, $633,735, 189 locations, $3,353 average, $2,996,678, 5 Weeks.

  20. My Little Pony: The Movie, Lionsgate, $602,945, 785 locations, $768 average, $20,861,496, 5 Weeks.

MovieStyle on 11/10/2017

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