Weekend Box Office: THE WILD ROBOT Rockets to No. 1, MEGALOPOLIS Falls on Debut

1. The Wild Robot
Universal Pictures/Dreamworks | NEW
$35M Domestic Opening Weekend
$53.065M Global Cume

Universal and Dreamworks look to have a winner on their hands as their new animated film The Wild Robot performed above our expectations with an estimated $35M from 3,962 screens for an $8,834 Per Screen Average to take the #1 position. Worries that Paramount’s rival animated bot epic Transformers One could cannibalize Wild Robot‘s audience were unfounded, with the Cybertron crew tanking in their second frame by taking only $9.3M (well below estimates) and on more screens (3970). Wild Robot also scored huge with critics and audiences, landing 98% on both fronts via the Rotten Tomatoes aggregate, an “A” CinemaScore, and 96% positive/62% definite recommend on Postrak.

This is the 25th DreamWorks Animation title opening to own a weekend and the third-biggest animated opening for September behind Sony’s Hotel Transylvania 2 ($48.4M) and Hotel Transylvania ($42.5M). Despite this being a kids’ movie headlined by Oscar-winner Lupita Nyong’o, the audience skewed male at 52%, with a majority of ticket-buyers over age 25 (58%). Only 23% were under age 12, meaning the movie has major appeal beyond its demo, similar to Brad Bird’s The Iron Giant.

Here’s how demographics looked:

• Caucasian – 42%
• Hispanic – 29%
• Asian – 18%
• African American – 8%
• Other – 4%

Here’s how it looked compared to the openings of other Chris Sanders movies domestically, his lowest animated opening by a hair…

• How to Train Your Dragon (2010) – $43.7M opening/$217.5M cume
• The Croods (2013) – $43.6M opening/$187.1M cume
• Lilo & Stitch (2002) – $35.2M opening/$145.7M cume
• The Wild Robot (2024) – $35M opening
• The Call of the Wild (2020) – $24.7M opening/$62.3M cume

While this new flick won’t break any records, being the 24th biggest opening for Dreamworks, it certainly seems primed to carry the family audience through October, especially with the two big comic book movies (Joker: Folie à Deux, Venom: The Last Dance) being more teen/grownup oriented. The Wild Robot has the potential to leg it out the same way Universal’s similarly autumnal-themed Migration did by opening small in December 2023 ($12.4M) but staying on its feet for 16 weekends until April 2024 ($127.3M domestic cume).

Overseas The Wild Robot opened in an additional 21 international markets, including Mexico, the Middle East, and Central America, after its soft opening in 8 markets last weekend. It earned $9.9 million (-44% drop) from 11,200 screens for a global cume of $53.065M. Most markets were fairly soft except for Mexico, where it opened in 928 theaters for a $3.676M take. The Top 3 were rounded out by Central America ($525K) and the U.A.E. ($507K).

6. Megalopolis
Lionsgate | NEW
$4M Domestic Opening Weekend

The Lionsgate cold streak at the box office continues unabated as Francis Ford Coppola’s long-gestating, self-financed epic Megalopolis opened to an estimated $4M at 1,854 locations for a $2,157 PSA, landing outside the Top 5 at #6. The studio won’t be affected by the film’s lackluster performance at the box office, as Lionsgate’s involvement with the project was solely on the distribution side. It has been a difficult transition year for Lionsgate at the box office, with recent titles like The Crow, Never Let Go, 1992, The Killer’s Game, and now Megalopolis, all Lionsgate films released within the last month, grossing a cumulative total of $29.6M.

Reviews for Megalopolis were divisive at best, with a 49% critical rating and 36% audience rating via Rotten Tomatoes, while the CinemaScore was a rare “D+” and PostTrak exit polling pulled only 1 star/49% positive indicating extremely poor word-of-mouth. Most features and reviews focused on the audacity of Coppola footing the bill for film’s large $120M budget, with little ink about the film’s Roman Empire-inspired themes.

Here’s how the 3-Day looked, including $770K in Thursday previews:

• Friday – $1.835M
• Saturday – $1.25M
• Sunday – $915K

IMAX screens were responsible for $1.4M domestically, a hefty 35% of the weekend cume, which combined with PLFs represented 41% of the total gross. Hence, the small audience that did attend wanted to experience it as an event, with some screenings including a live actor participant during one scene. Overseas 134 IMAX screens in select markets brought in an additional $400K.

For the last few years Adam Driver has become the patron saint of passion projects from old school auteurs, including Martin Scorsese (Silence), Terry Gilliam (The Man Who Killed Don Quixote), Michael Mann (Ferrari), and now Coppola. Unfortunately, none of these films has been particularly winning in a box office or awards sense, and Driver has yet to prove himself a draw outside of the Star Wars franchise. While Megalopolis has some potential for technical awards next year, critical and audience response all but guarantees it will be snubbed in main categories.

Coppola himself has had three major periods in his career: the boy genius run in the 70’s of the two Godfather films, The Conversation, and Apocalypse Now, followed by the bombing of One From the Heart in 1982 which sent him into a decade+ of hit-or-miss director-for-hire jobs (The Outsiders, Bram Stoker’s Dracula, The Rainmaker), and finally the more recent period of art films financed with winery money which were initially small (Youth Without Youth, Tetro, Twixt) and grossed less than a million domestically between them. Megalopolis got more publicity than the previous art films because of its epic scope and impressive cast, not to mention that it had been talked about for decades, including a version that came close to being made just prior to 9/11 in the early 2000s. While there is potential for his new film to attain cult status in years to come, it likely won’t get there through its original theatrical run.

Other Notable Performances

Even though it had far less domestic publicity, NTR Entertainment’s Telugu-language action-drama Devara Part 1 managed to out-do Megalopolis with a $5.6M opening weekend take on only 1,040 screens for a $5,385 PSA (second only to Wild Robot among wide releases) to take the #4 spot on the charts. That includes $280K from 59 IMAX screens, with the majority earned on Thursday alone. Starring RRR‘s N.T. Rama Rao Jr. in dual roles as one brother who finds out the other is smuggling weapons, the film received $2.5 million in pre-sales alone.

Sony’s Saturday Night, based on the 1975 debut of TV comedy institution “Saturday Night Live,” launched strong with $265K on 5 screens in New York and Los Angeles for a $53K PSA. This is the first of a three-phase release plan for the Jason Reitman picture, which will get an expanded limited run on October 4 before going wide on October 11 to generate awards season buzz. The film currently boasts a 79% critical rating on Rotten Tomatoes.

Sunday’s Studio Weekend Estimates | Weekend 39 – 2024
Total 3-Day Domestic Estimates: $89,617,529M | (+4.42% vs 2023)