SPIDER-MAN: NO WAY HOME continued its record-breaking run by grossing $81.5M in its second weekend in theatres. SING 2 won the battle for second place easily with $23.8M in ticket sales. THE MATRIX RESSURECTIONS finished third with $12M, somewhat below expectations. Two possible reasons for these disappointing results are that Warner Bros released it simultaneously on HBO MAX and that it had to compete with SPIDER-MAN for placement on IMAX screens. AMERICAN UNDERDOG finished with a so-so $6.2M and A JOUPNAL FOR JORDAN limped in with a mere $2.2M. LICORICE PIZZA expanded from an exclusive debut last weekend at four theatres in NY and LA to 786 locations nationwide, finishing with $2.3M to take seventh place overall and maintaining a healthy per-screen average of $2,962.
Unfortunately for SPIDEY and all other hold-over titles, the beginning of the film week fell on Christmas Eve, when holiday movie-going usually tails off as most theatres close down early after 8 pm showtimes. The fact that Christmas Eve was a Friday was a second hit to the box office since Friday is often the strongest night of the week. This Friday, Spidey took an 83% hit compared to last week, though the situation stabilized for Saturday and Sunday. SPIDER-MAN suffered an overall drop of 69% from its opening weekend, still not a bad result considering that its premiere was the second biggest of all time.
As of now, only SPIDER-MAN: NO WAY HOME and SING 2 can be counted on for a strong finish in the final week of the year. It will be a photo finish to see if this year’s fourth quarter will add up to 70% of the same quarter in 2019. The full-year results for 2021 will come in at 40% of those from 2019. There are many unknowns ahead as the calendar flips to 2022.