Using Christmas Day as a jumping off point, the last weekend of 2019 will enjoy a full five days of movie going with children out of school, parents off work and families looking for someplace warm to spend a few hours and there is plenty to choose from. Disney hopes audiences will turn up for the second weekend of
Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker while new offerings include Fox's animated feature
Spies in Disguise, Sony's
Little Women and A24 has gone wide with
Uncut Gems. The last time Christmas fell on a Wednesday was 2013 and before that 2002, so we'll be looking at those two weekends for some guidance as to just how well this weekend's films will perform thanks to the lucrative holiday timing.
Set to repeat atop the box office is Disney's
Rise of Skywalker. The latest installment in the Star Wars franchise delivered the
second largest Christmas Day gross all-time on Wednesday and should easily post a better hold over its second weekend
than Last Jedi did a couple year back when it dipped -67.5%. Right now we're anticipating a drop around -45% this weekend and a three-day just shy of $98 million for a domestic cume topping $380 million by Sunday.
For the next two spots, the weekend should mimic last weekend's results with
Jumanji: The Next Level and
Frozen II taking the second and third spots respectively. Right now we're looking for Jumanji to deliver a weekend performance over $38 million for a domestic cume topping $175 million while Frozen II should land $19+ million, pushing its domestic cume over $420 million by the end of the weekend.
Last Friday, Sony came out with expectations for the five-day weekend for
Little Women, anticipating a $16-17 million opening from 3,308 locations. The film delivered a $6.4 million opening day on Christmas and now the studio is projecting a five-day north of $22 million, and yet we're still seeing potential for a larger performance. The $6.4 million opening is nearly $1.5 million ahead of the Wednesday opening for
Crazy Rich Asians last year and that film went on to gross over $35 million over its first five days. Added to that, Little Women is pacing just behind Crazy Rich Asians over the two weeks leading up to release as well as performing similarly to September's release of
Downton Abbey, which has us anticipating a three-day north of $17 million and a five day performance topping $30 million.
The question now becomes what film rounds out the top five. We're anticipating Lionsgate's
Knives Out will continue its strong run and deliver a three-day around $12 million, but will that be enough to hold off Fox's animated release
Spies in Disguise?
Spies in Disguise delivered $4.8 million on Christmas Day and heading into the film's opening, the studio was anticipating a five-day launch around $20 million. Given the film's opening day, a performance closer to studio expectations would mean we'd be looking at a three-day around $10 million, but some industry expectations are now putting the film's five-day opening closer to $25 million, which would suggest a three-day closer to $15-16 million. A look at IMDb page views shows Spies pacing poorly when compared to releases such as 2013's
Turbo, 2015's
The Good Dinosaur and 2017's
Ferdinand, which has us projecting a performance close to the lower end of the two aforementioned scenarios and a three-day around $11 million.
A couple of spots further down the list we find A24's
Uncut Gems, which enjoyed a strong Christmas Day showing as it expanded into 2,341 locations and now this weekend we're looking for a three-day performance around $8-9 million.
Limited releases already in theaters include Universal's
1917 in 11 theaters and WB's
Just Mercy in just four locations, both will be expanding nationwide in the coming weeks.
This weekend's forecast is directly below. This post will be updated with Friday estimates on Saturday morning followed by a complete weekend recap on Sunday.