Box Office Predictions: ‘Civil War’ Poised To Become A24’s First #1 Domestic Debut
Box Office analysis is provided by Daniel Garris of BoxOfficeReport.com.
Weekend Box Office Predictions: April 12th, 2024 - April 14th, 2024
A24's Civil War appears to be in store for a break-out start at the box office this weekend. The Alex Garland directed film starring Kirsten Dunst depicts the United States during a second American Civil War. The film is getting a larger push than usual for a typical A24 release, which should help Civil War easily set a new opening weekend record for A24 (a mark currently held by 2018's Hereditary with a debut of $13.58 million). In addition to the film's subject matter and the growing buzz around the film, Civil War will also be helped out by fans of Garland and Dunst, good critical reviews and from playing on IMAX screens. While some potential moviegoers may also be turned off by the film's subject matter (especially in a presidential election year), Civil War nonetheless appears as though it will still have more mainstream appeal than usual for an A24 release. Civil War could also benefit from opening in an overall marketplace that is fairly quiet at the moment (other than holdover business for Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire). BoxOfficeReport is predicting that Civil War will debut with $26.0 million this weekend, which would nearly double the opening weekend performance of Hereditary.
Warner Bros. and Legendary's Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire is coming off of a second weekend performance which saw the film decline a sharp, but understandable 61.0 percent to hold steady in first place with $31.20 million. With the film's second weekend decline behind it, the fairly well received Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire should begin to stabilize this weekend, though that potential stabilization will be limited somewhat by Civil War entering the marketplace, especially with Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire losing its IMAX screens to Civil War. At the same time, Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire looks to be holding onto a high percentage of its non-IMAX screens this weekend and is only losing 101 locations from last weekend (for a total of 3,847 locations this weekend). It's also possible that some of the moviegoers not interested in seeing Civil War this weekend could make their way to Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire, who may not have otherwise. Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire could decline 51.0 percent this weekend to take second place with $15.3 million.
Meanwhile, a trio of high-profile holdovers should find themselves fairly bunched together this weekend. Universal and DreamWorks Animation's Kung Fu Panda 4 could decline by just 26.7 percent to take third place with $5.7 million, Sony's Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire could decrease a respectable 43.4 percent to follow in fourth with $5.1 million and Warner Bros. and Legendary's Dune: Part Two could slide a similar 42.1 percent (due in part to losing the remainder of its IMAX screens), to round out the weekend's top five with $4.3 million.
After failing to light the box office on fire last weekend with respective debuts of $10.12 million and $8.35 million, Universal's Monkey Man and Disney / 20th Century's The First Omen are both likely to experience sharp second weekend declines this weekend. While both films have gone over well with critics, both films look to be losing a large percentage of their showtimes per location from last weekend, which certainly won't help matters this weekend. Monkey Man in particular is also likely to take a hit from the likely cross-over between its audience and the audience for Civil War. Monkey Man could decline 60.5 percent from last weekend to land in sixth with $4.0 million and The First Omen could decrease 54.5 percent to follow in seventh with a similar $3.8 million.
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