The Lost City dethrones The Batman at the box office

The Lost City dethroned The Batman over the weekend and its box office victory was a win for comedy and the female demographic during the pandemic.

The Lost City opened to $31 million over the weekend which was VERY close to my $30 million prediction. This is a return to form for comedy at the box office as it has mostly been shipped to streaming services in recent years and it’s proof that the female demographic will come out for a project if it looks like a must-see. They did it for House of Gucci last November and they did for The Lost City this weekend. Per Deadline, they showed up at 61% overall, with those over 35 repping close to half the crowd. So why did this work? The film has solid reviews at 76% fresh on Rotten Tomatoes. Moviegoers seem to love it even more with an 85% audience score and a “B+” CinemaScore. Then there are the leads. Sandra Bullock and Channing Tatum are both box office draws. Their appeal alone could’ve sold this movie. The Lost City also launched in 16 smaller markets overseas and pulled in an additional $3.7 million. These markets only represent 7% of the international rollout with major markets starting to release the film on April 15, 2022.

In second place we find The Batman with a gross of $20.5 million. That’s a drop of 44% and it was also VERY close to my predictions from earlier in the week. The Batman still isn’t facing direct competition from a similar film so it has been able to have the market in its genre virtually to itself since opening in early March. To date, The Batman has grossed $331.9 million domestically and after pulling in an additional $25 million from overseas markets, the film brings its global haul to $672.9 million.

In third place, we have the three-hour action movie, RRR. The film includes an intermission and ticket prices that average at $22.54 per seat and this allowed the film to gross $9.5 million over the weekend. The movie opened to $4.5 million on its opening day but the Indian Telugu-language action project was pretty frontloaded and it mostly collapsed throughout the weekend. That being said, it’s still a solid opening in the domestic market and it’s only playing at 1,200 locations. The film won’t be more than a memory next weekend but for now, the Sarigama Cinemas release gets to celebrate.

Uncharted slips to fourth place with a gross of $5 million. That’s a drop of 36% which is still a solid hold for a film that opened last month. The Tom Holland release now brings its domestic total to $133.5 million and after pulling in an additional $7.7 million from foreign markets, the movie brings its worldwide total to $357.5 million.

Rounding out the top five is Jujuktsu Kaisen 0, which managed to cling to the top five with a gross of $4.5 million. That’s a massive drop of 75% from last weekend but it still allowed the film to not fall out of the top five, which I was expecting. To date, the film brings its domestic total to $27.7 million.

Outside the top five, we have Spider-Man: No Way Home in eighth place but the reason the film is getting mentioned is because the movie has grossed $800.5 million after taking in $2 million over the weekend. This was the last milestone we were expecting for Spidey’s latest adventure and the film managed to do it after 15 weeks of release.

What are YOUR thoughts on this weekend’s box office results?