by Keith Simanton ---- May 24, 2015
Opening in 3,972 locations Tomorrowland took in a lower than expected $40.7M just beating out Pitch Perfect 2 and its projected $37.9M in what proved to be a drowsy four-day Memorial weekend frame.
The Brad Bird/George Clooney collaboration ended up the 22nd biggest Memorial opener of all time, sitting somewhat ignominiously behind 2013's Epic ($42.8M) and ahead of 2010's Prince of Persia: Sands of Time ($37.8M). Without a strong tentpole to anchor it the holiday frame looks to be down 19% YOY.
Internationally Tomorrowland opened in 65 territories (56% of the total available) and made $26.7M for a $58.8M worldwide cume. It opened at the #1 spot in Russia and Mexico, and has yet to open in major markets such as Spain, Australia, China, Japan, Korea and Brazil.
Still, it's not the greeting that Disney received for its other attraction-based film, Pirates of the Caribbean, whose third film in the series, At World's End, remains the Memorial Day champion with $139M domestically in 2007.
The only other major new competition, Fox's Poltergeist reboot, did about as expected with $27.7M for the four-day frame ($23 for the three-day) in 3,240 theaters and an $8.3K per theater take. Guesstimates were on the lower end of the 20s for the Sam Rockwell starrer.
In other holdover news Mad Max: Fury Road proved it may have the stamina it needs to be considered a success. With an impressive second week drop of only -47%, the film took in $38.2m domestically. Internationally it zoomed past the $100M mark with $124.3M, bringing the worldwide gross to $212M.
Meanwhile, Pitch Perfect 2 may have held the 2nd berth but its domestic take dropped 56% WOW. The musical/comedy might be keeping just ahead of Max in the States but its international cume is lagging at $187.1M. Then again, it didn't cost over $150M either.
We also can't forget Avengers: Age of Ultron. The Marvel/Disney film crossed $200M in China. It's also expected to cross the $400M mark here domestically and is the only film to do that so far this year. Internationally the film will cross the $800M threshhold for a $1.2B worldwide take. It still has to keep going to eclipse Furious 7's $1.5B worldwide gross, which is seems likely to do.
