As part of the apparent trend towards a rebirth of adult-orientated movies being successful, Denzel Washington’s final outing as Robert McCall in The Equalizer 3 topped the box office for the weekend. It pulled in $34.5 million domestically and $26.1 million overseas for a $60.6 million worldwide debut over the weekend. It is estimated that it will rise to over $41 million by the end of Monday’s Labor Day holiday.
Not only is this ahead of projections, but it would mark the second-biggest Labor Day opening weekend, behind Marvel’s Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings which took $75 million for the three-day and $94.6 million for the four-day. way behind is Rob Zombie’s Halloween with $30 million for the four-day total.
It has a solid 76% (6.1/10) with critics and a strong 94% with audiences on Rotten Tomatoes. All of this is on a $70 million budget, which is positively parsimonious these days. Profits will follow, but lessons will not be learned wider in Hollywood.
Barbie came in second with $9.7 million over the weekend with up to $12.6 million estimated through Monday. Blue Beetle is third ($6.6. up to $8.6 million) with Gran Turismo falling from first to fourth with $6.5 million for the three-day and $8.4 million through Monday.
Oppenheimer remains in the top five ($5.3 up to $7 million) crossing the $850 million mark worldwide. It is Nolan’s third highest-grossing film behind only the last two Dark Knight movies, causing Warner’s to no doubt be kicking themselves as they could have had a box office bonanza summer of Barbie + Oppenheimer = big fat bonuses.
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