‘The Curse of La Llorona’ Scares Up Easter Weekend Win [Box Office]

It’s the calm before the storm weekend, and Warner Bros./New Line has two success stories coming out of Easter. First up, “The Conjuring” series keeps posting results. The sixth film in the series (‘Conjuring 3’ doesn’t come out until 2020), “The Curse of La Llorona,” a horror spin-off from the series won the weekend singlehandedly with a very nice $26.5 million; even better when you consider the movie cost $9 million to make. The six films have grossed $1.569 billion worldwide, a fantastic figure when you consider that the cost of all six movies combined is just over $100 million. This is why these films continue to be a success, and WB pretty much lets ‘Conjuring’ producers James Wan and Peter Safran do their thing.

It was also a very solid weekend for New Line’s “Shazam!” superhero movie. Thanos is coming, and the franchise knows it, but “Shazam!” did about as well as could be expected and even them some in weekend three. The David F. Sandberg-directed film boasted a terrific -29.1% hold from last weekend and grossed a very solid $17.3 million. “Shazam!” is now at $121.3 million domestically and $322 million worldwide. Of course, Thanos and “Avengers: Endgame” is about to decimate the superhero competition and likely any follow-up weekend drops could end up being extremely harsh. But “Shazam!” did exactly what it needed to do in this critical third weekend. A good ending success for “Shazam!” would be $400 million, if it can muster the strength to get there despite ‘Endgame.’ Even that figure would be one of the lowest grossing superhero movie totals in years (2003’s “X2” hit $407million years and years before the superhero craze), but considering its cost (a more modest $100 million) and the fierce competition (Marvel movies in front and behind it), $400 million worldwide would be a good case scenario for the DCEU film. One couldn’t call that a smashing success compared to any superhero movies of this modern era, but at least the movie isn’t a critically-reviled bomb.

Also new in theaters, 20^th Century Fox’s spiritual movie “Breakthrough”—about praying so damn hard your child comes back to life after a certain death accident—cracked $11 million in its opening weekend which is pretty good for this type of film. One other wide release newcomer landed in theaters (“Penguins (Disneynature)”), but it failed to crack the top ten.

The rest of the Easter Weekend story was holdovers. In a very good sign for Marvel Studios, not that they really need the help, but “Captain Marvel” actually grew 6% in theaters despite Disney cutting 322 screens this country. This boon means, some Marvel fans are actually re-watching the film in preparation of ‘Endgame,’ while other fans are finally getting around to see it before Marvel’s mega-movie hits theaters. The $9 million boost “Captain Marvel” received means the film has cracked $400 million domestically and should be able to beat the “Wonder Woman” box office record ($412M) likely by next weekend. This figure also makes “Captain Marvel” 2019’s highest grossing film to date, worldwide and domestically, but it should enjoy that figure while it can and before Thanos arrives. The movie is currently at $1,089 billion and will crack $1.1 billion shortly. Now, the Marvel superheroine movie is the 25^th highest grossing film of all time and Marvel’s 7^th highest grossing film to date. So much for that MRA boycott.

In other box office milestones, Disney’s “Dumbo” cracked the $300 million mark which is good for it, but definitely on the low-end of Disney live-action adaptations of their classic animated films. “Pet Sematary” has stalled however and hasn’t even cracked $100 million worldwide which isn’t a terrific sign. In its fifth week of release Jordan Peele’s “Us” showed legs and held on with only a minor -37% drop from its gross last weekend. The horror thriller didn’t quite receive the same buzz as the breakout smash success of “Get Out,” but its domestic and worldwide totals ($170M/$245M) should match surpass its predecessors’ totals before all is said and done. Taking it in the teeth this second weekend, Lionsgate’s “Hellboy” is essentially toast. The film, already roasted by critics fell 68% this weekend and only took in $3.8 million. This reboot, which Lionsgate has stressed was financed by Millennium Films, not themselves, will be gone from the top 10 next weekend and who knows how long the company will keep it in theaters, period.

The success story of the weekend at the art house was the movie most embattled in the arthouse discourse. A24 Films’ “Under The Silver Lake” has gone through quite the journey: panned at Cannes, having its release date pushed twice, Film Twitter folks were angered when word arrived that ‘Silver Lake’ was essentially receiving a one-weekend theatrical release before it would be available on VOD. Well, that loud and passionate crowd might be on to something as the David Robert Mitchell-directed movie won the limited weekend release field, coming in with an excellent PSA— $40,157 from 2 screens for a $20,079 per screen average. Nothing came close in comparison, not IFC’s “Red Joan” ($$10,158 PSA), Magnolia’s “Hail Satan?” ($8,567 PSA), The Film Arcade’s “Family” ($6,800 PSA). Sadly, two of the most critically acclaimed limited releases of the week fell flat on their face. “Little Woods” starring Tessa Thompson and Lily James and “Fast Color” starring Gugu Mbatha-Raw were both box-office non-starters. The former posted a low PSA, $66,415 from 33 screens ($2,013 PSA) and the latter did even worse ($37,500 from 25 for a $1,500 PSA). Support your local arthouse and critically-acclaimed stories with good intentions, people, these movies are for real movie lovers.

1. The Curse of La Llorona—Warner Bros. — $26,505,000
2. Shazam! — WB — $17,340,000 ($121,341,951)
3. Breakthrough — Fox — $11,100,000 ($14,606,925)
4. Captain Marvel — Buena Vista — $9,100,000 ($400,026,133)
5. Little—Universal— $8,451,000 ($29,380,410)
6. Dumbo—Buena Vista– $6,800,000 ($101,254,910)
7. Pet Sematary— Paramount— $4,850,000 ($49,583,075)
8. Missing Link—United Artist Releasing— $4,369,756 ($12,976,997)
9. Us—Universal— $4,264,000 ($170,444,620)
10. Hellboy — Lionsgate— $3,880,000 ($19,676,271)