Weekend Estimates: New Mutants Posts $7 Million Opening

August 30, 2020

Although the war for survival of the theatrical business is only beginning, The New Mutants is at least winning a small early battle by posting an opening weekend that is in line with expectations. In fact, the film will exactly hit our pre-weekend prediction of $7 million, according to Disney’s Sunday morning projection.

Beyond the top-line number, signals are mixed. Mutants’ theater average of $2,903 is better than Unhinged’s $2,206 last weekend, but its box office fell on both Saturday and Sunday, suggesting poor word of mouth. Unhinged itself is down 35% from last weekend, even though it gained an extra 508 theaters. The other new releases were weak (although what a joy to see something new).

The New Mutants posted $3.1 million on Friday, $2.45 million on Saturday, and Disney is projecting $1.45 million today. That represents a 21% decline on Saturday, and 41% on Sunday. By way of comparison, Unhinged gained 11% from Friday to Saturday last weekend. Clearly Mutants day-to-day numbers have been influenced by pent up demand for the film, and word of mouth isn’t great. There is good news in that bad news though: a film with better legs would earn substantially more over a full weekend. For example, if Mutants had maintained its Friday theater average of $1,285 through the weekend, it would be set to earn $9.3 million over three days. The market is clearly ready to produce a $10 million weekend for the right movie, and Tenet should easily top that number.

Unhinged’s opening weekend is down 35% from last weekend, per Solstice. That’s somewhat disappointing, given it gained 508 theaters, but it is in fairly direct competition with The New Mutants, which almost certainly didn’t help.

Bill & Ted Face the Music took third, according to the numbers we’re seeing. United Artists hasn’t released an official number, and may choose not to do so given the film is also playing on PVOD this weekend, and that’s where it’ll have made most of its money. The film was also heavily front-loaded, and is declining each day through the weekend.

In fourth, The Personal History of David Copperfield will pick up a modest $520,000, according to Disney’s projection. Its day-to-day performance has been fairly solid: up 14% on Saturday, and expected to be down 21% on Sunday, which most likely reflects an older demographic. Its theater average is a disappointing $382, which is probably down to that older cohort being less inclined to risk a trip to a movie theater right now. We’re seeing a similar theater average for the faith-based film Fatima, which also skews older.

In another small encouraging sign for the business, Words on Bathroom Walls is holding up well in its second weekend, and will be in fifth place. We don’t have an official number from Roadside Attractions yet.

A couple of limited releases are doing relatively well, based on the numbers we’ve seen. The re-release of Bring the Soul: The Movie, and the Chinese sensation The Eight Hundred are both outperforming David Copperfield on a per-theater basis. No official numbers have been posted so far for either title.

- Weekend estimates
- Friday estimates
- Saturday estimates
- Sunday estimates
- Theater Counts
- Weekend predictions: a slate of new releases
- Limited and virtual releases: will limited releases deliver?

Bruce Nash

Filed under: Weekend Estimates, The New Mutants, Fatima, Words on Bathroom Walls, Bill & Ted Face the Music, The Personal History of David Copperfield, Tenet, Unhinged, Ba bai, Bill & Ted