In case you've been living under a rock for the whole month of June, "Wonder Woman" has, so far, been the most talked about movie this summer. Its three-week domestic total is almost $300 Million. The importance is immense for the future of female-directed blockbusters, not mention with the addition of a female lead.
Patty Jenkins' film finished second at the box-office, only eclipsed by franchise juggernaut "Cars 3" which raked in a disappointing $53.5M, the weakest opener of the franchise thus far. I haven't seen the film, I skipped last week's press screening. and doubt I will all due in part to "Cars 2" being the absolute worst Pixar I have ever seen. Pixar all but jumped the shark with this franchise, I look more forward to their other project, "Coco," being released this fall.
The juicier news though is the fact that we can add a few more titles to the 'Summer box-office bombs bucket' as Sony's tame, middling "Rought Night," starring ScarJo, made a limp showing in its first weekend with an estimated $8.5M, yikes.
However, the 2Pac bio-pic "All Eyez On Me" seems to have benefitted from not screening for critics as it amassed an impressive $27M which was enough to land it steadily in third place. What does this mean exactly? Well, a few things. Firstly, there is a large market for hip-hop driven biopics, just look at the success of "Straight Outta Compton," but, more importantly, Lionsgate's decision to not screen the movie for critics, something Sony and other studios have been tempted to do due in part to bad reviews and an ugly-looking RottenTomatoes score, was successful and could lead other studios to follow suit. Let's see if others will follow suit in the coming weeks.