It was a good weekend for CG-animated hairballs at the box office. In North American theaters, John Krasinski’s hybrid pic IF captured audiences’ imaginations, attaining a chart-topping debut weekend for Paramount Pictures. The film pulled in $33.7 million from 4,041 screens, surpassing 20th’s Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes in its second weekend ($25.45M; $100.7M total).
The highest-grossing fully-animated pic on the domestic charts is still Universal/DreamWorks Animation’s Kung Fu Panda 4, which came in at No. 13 in its 11th week with $925K, bringing its home turf total to $192.6M ($533.5M worldwide).
According to industry trackers, IF attracted half-and-half family and general audiences, ready for new all-ages fare despite the film’s 46% Rotten Tomatoes ranking. That said, the star-packed imaginary friends adventure (led by Ryan Reynolds with voices by Steve Carrell, Emily Blunt, Maya Rudolph, Louis Gossett Jr., Matt Damon, Awkwafina and more) boasts an 87% audience rating on RT as well as an “A” CinemaScore, boosting its word of mouth through the weekend.
Set to finally bow in NorAm theaters this weekend (May 24), The Garfield Movie from Sony and Alcon, directed by animation veteran Mark Dindal, continues to gobble up overseas ticket sales. Jon Davis’ iconic tabby, in his first fully-CG-animated theatrical feature, clawed out an additional $10.3M from 8,800 screens in 27 markets. Despite nibbling off -28% from the previous frame, that brings the kitty caper to $49M total from just 60% of its release territories.
Making up healthy portions of Garfield‘s international B.O. (so far) are Mexico ($12.85M, opened May 3), Spain ($3.6M, May 3), Germany ($1.965M, May 9), Italy ($1.74M, May 1), The Netherlands ($1.42M, May 2) and Colombia ($1.41M, May 2).
The early projections for The Garfield Movie‘s three-day Memorial Weekend domestic box office is around $35 million. The movie has tough competition from Warner Bros.’ Mad Max prequel, Furiosa, which is expected to bring in $40 million to $50 million Stateside.
[Sources: BoxOfficeMojo, Collider, Deadline]
