‘Freaky’ Repeats as Winner of Quiet U.S. Box Office With $1.2 Million

Danish filmmaker Thomas Vinterberg is back in the Oscar race with Another Round (Druk), a film whose star, Mads Mikkelsen, calls “an embracement of life.”

Rebecca Davis editorPatriotic Chinese viewers flexed their muscles this weekend to topple Paul W.S. Anderson’s “Monster Hunter,” which grossed just $4.8 million before it was pulled from cinemas due to complaints that interpreted a line of dialogue to be racist and “insulting to China.” In a slow week, however, that was enough to net it a fifth place open, even though cinemas had entirely pulled the title from their line-ups by early Saturday.

Universal and DreamWorks Animation's The Croods: A New Age topped another tough weekend at the North American box office with $4.4 million for a 10-day domestic total of $20.4 million amid the ongoing COVID-19 crisis. By Christmas, though, the animated family film will be available in the home via premium VOD.

It was a drama-filled weekend at the Chinese multiplex. Tencent's big-budget video game adaptation Monster Hunter was yanked from cinemas one day into its release over a scene local audiences decried as derogatory.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau ChiefCinemas in Korea are trying to adapt to new straitened circumstances as the autumn box office recovery peters out.

It goes without saying that the domestic box office is struggling. That said, it feels that we are trying to find different ways of framing that story every week.  At the end of the day, it’s a win to report any numbers at all considering the circumstances — especially for the specialty box office space where many titles are going straight to digital or debuting in a virtual cinema.

Refresh for latest…: Sunday’s international box office reporting looks vastly different to what was expected coming into the weekend. A Friday gross that portended a high-teens launch for Monster Hunter in China was quickly thwarted when local authorities pulled the feature game adaptation from the country’s cinemas.

supply chain problems are already surfacing — AMC Theaters has already voiced its objections to the studio’s plans and promised to defend its interests in ongoing talks.“Croods: A New Age” will soon join the ranks of early streaming releases, as the deal made between Universal and several major theater chains will allow them to release the film on PVOD after next weekend.

The Croods: A New Age is continuing to dominate at the box office.

Dave McNary Film ReporterUniversal and DreamWorks’ “The Croods: A New Age” repeated as winner of a mild post-Thanksgiving weekend with $4.4 million at 2,205 North American locations.The animated comedy sequel, featuring a voice cast of Nicolas Cage, Emma Stone and Ryan Reynolds, has been dominating the seriously subdued moviegoing business since its Nov. 25 launch with $20.3 million in its first dozen days.

Nick Vivarelli International CorrespondentItalian cinemas are set to stay closed over the holidays after Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte extended Italy’s soft lockdown until early January. The widely expected move comes as the country contends with a flare up of the pandemic.

Warner Bros. is plotting a sweeping response to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, which has shuttered movie theaters around the country.

plan for a global theatrical roll-out of sequel “Wonder Woman 1984” ahead of a U.S. launch on HBO Max is a mixed blessing for cinema operators in Europe, where national lockdowns have tempered enthusiasm for a tentpole release amid the pandemic.“Releasing ‘Wonder Woman’ in December is sheer madness; it’s insanity,” said one exhibition boss who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

Universal's The Croods: A New Age was the decisive winner of a competitive three-way race at China's box office over the weekend, topping both holdover local hit Caught in Time and the latest release from venerated Chinese filmmaker Zhang Yimou. Croods 2 opened in China to a healthy $19.2 million, which was $5 million more than its five-day holiday start in North America.

Despite the most challenged Thanksgiving box office in modern times, The Croods: A New Age managed to come in ahead of projections with a five-day holiday debut of $14.2 million, including $9.7 million for the weekend. Overseas, the family film launched in seven markets to $20.8 million — led by $19.2 million in China — for a global bow of $35 million.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau ChiefThe box office outlook in South Korea, which last year was the world’s fourth largest theatrical market, turned from bad to worse.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau ChiefHong Kong-produced “Caught in Time” gave fresh life to the mainland China box office over its opening weekend.The fantasy crime thriller about a cop chasing a gang through different eras earned $30.3 million. Produced by Emperor Motion Picture, the film stars the popular Daniel Wu and Wang Qianyuan, and was directed by Lau Ho-leung.It edged aside patriotic war film “Sacrifice” which had held the top spot for the previous three weekends.

Dino-Ray Ramos Associate Editor/ReporterThere aren’t any huge surprises in the specialty box office as we enter what is expected to be a very different Thanksgiving holiday week. Normally, this would be the time of year where people would be participating in post-Thanksgiving dinner moviegoing.