Sandra Bullock and Channing Tatum’s The Lost City opened to a better-than-expected $31 million domestically from 4,252 theaters in a significant win for the box office recovery.
Until now, males under the age of 35 have fueled the rebound, while titles depending upon older adults — particularly older females — have lagged.
Paramount’s Lost City, an action-packed romance adventure that’s a throwback to the era of Romancing the Stone, bucked that trend in a major way. Roughly 60 percent of Friday ticket buyers were female, while a whopping 47 percent were over 35.
The gender demo changed somewhat as the weekend went on, but females still led by 56 percent. The age breakdown stayed the same, meaning that nearly half of all ticket buyers were 35 and older.
The movie over-indexed everywhere west of the Mississippi, was at norm in the southeast and under-indexed in the northeast. Canada came in with a healthy 7.5 percent. Top markets that over-indexed included Salt Lake City, Phoenix, Denver, Tampa, Minneapolis, Portland, Kansas City, Indianapolis, Albuquerque, Honolulu and Oklahoma City. Top markets that under-indexed included New York, Chicago, Houston, Atlanta, Philadelphia and Boston.
“The Lost City has breathed theatrical life into the adventure-comedy-romance genre which has been somewhat scarce of late,” Paramount domestic distribution president Chris Aronson said. “A sensational opening!”
Daniel Radcliffe of Harry Potter fame also stars in the movie, which made its world premiere at the SXSW festival earlier this month.
Overseas, the film earned $3.7 million from its first 16 smaller-sized markets.
The Batman continued to fare nicely, earning $20.5 million to finish Sunday at $332 million domestically. It earned another $25 million overseas for a foreign tally of $340 million and $672.9 million worldwide, including a hefty $52.7 million from Imax theaters. One weak link is China, where numerous cinemas have closed amid a new surge in COVID-19 cases. Batman tumbled to $3.1 million in its second weekend for a China total of $17.9 million, according to Warners.
Indian action pic RRR made headlines in its North America debut, where it came in third with $9.5 million from 1,160 locations, a record for an Indian film. Distributor Sarigami is treating the movie as an event offering and is charging more for tickets.
Climbing adventure Infinite Storm (Bleecker Street), starring Naomi Watts, didn’t fare so well. The film opted to debut nationwide or in 1,525 locations. The Bleecker Street release opened to a dismal $751,296.
At the specialty box office, the acclaimed Everything Everywhere All at Once (A24), starring Michelle Yeoh, was a breakout hit with a weekend location average of $50,965 from 10 locations in New York, Los Angeles and San Francisco.
Mothering Sunday (Sony Pictures Classics), starring Odessa Young, opened in five cinemas. The film’s weekend per location average was $1,800 or thereabouts.
Among holdovers back in the top 10, Sony and Marvel’s Spider-Man: No Way Home still had plenty to boast more than three months after first opening in theaters. The superhero pic has became only the third film in history to cross the $800 million mark domestically, behind Avengers: Endgame ($858.4 million) and Star Wars: The Force Awakens ($936.7 million), not adjusted for inflation.
Spidey grossed $2 million for the weekend to finish Sunday with a domestic total of $800.5 million and $1.88 billion globally.
March 27, 7:40 a.m. Updated with revised estimates.