Weekend Box Office Winners
According to Brad Brevet of Box Office Mojo, the weekend box office was bolstered by two strong openings for both new, major releases. The Screen Gems thriller, The Perfect Guy topped the box office with $26.7 million and M. Night Shyamalan's micro-budget thriller The Visit was a very close second with an estimated $25.6 million.
Perfect Guy, which starred Michael Ealy (his third $25+ million opening in a row), Sanaa Lathan and Morris Chestnut, is now the third film in a row featuring a predominantly African American leading cast to take #1 at the box office, capping a five weekend streak started by Straight Outta Compton and continued by War Room.
While it wasn't screened for critics, Perfect Guy appears to have appealed to its opening day audience, receiving an a "A-" CinemaScore. Made on only a $12 million budget, however, low budget domestic thrillers toplined by black casts such as Perfect Guy, No Good Deed and Obsessed are clearly hitting home with audiences. The timing for the release of this sub-genre, the second weekend in September, just might be the perfect slot as Perfect Guy is looking at entering the list of top fifteen September openings.
Shyamalan's Visit is a win for the filmmaker who has struggled as of late with his studio features. Made on a $5 million budget, The Visit was picked up by horror's new master producer, Jason Blum, who took it to Universal where he has a multi-picture deal and it appears to have worked out well for all involved. The Visit also opened in 14 markets in Europe where it brought in an estimated $3.8 million for a worldwide total of nearly $30 million, six-times its production budget.
Fans of Shyamalan that have stood by the Sixth Sense director as his career wobbled in recent years with the likes of The Happening, The Last Airbender and 2013's After Earth also seem satisfied, though the opening day, "B-" CinemaScore suggests this one may suffer a steep drop next weekend. That's fairly normal for front-loaded horror features and with such a small budget and strong opening weekend The Visit has already done its job. It will be interesting to see where Shyamalan goes next.
Finally, Disney's Inside Out pulled it off; the latest from Pixar moved just ahead of Furious 7 and is now the third highest grossing domestic release of 2015 with $351.4 million and a worldwide total of $747.3 million placing it fifth for 2015.
West Wind Drive Ins continues to show Perfect Guy and The Visit through at least September 23rd. Check out our schedules to see showtimes.
