Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle enjoyed a second week atop the US box office, holding off challenges from Steven Spielberg’s The Post, Liam Neeson actioner The Commuter, and the marmalade and sterling snaffling British blockbuster, Paddington 2.
Sony’s surprise seasonal smash-hit Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle earned another estimated $27m, pushing its total towards the $300 million mark. Bonus points were also earned from the film’s opening in China, where it debuted with $40 million, for a worldwide cume of $667 million.
Hoping to make it ‘game over’ for Jumanji was the wide expansion of critically acclaimed Pentagon Papers drama The Post. Steven Spielberg’s potential Oscar botherer raked in an estimated $18.6 million for a second place finish.
This meant that Lionsgate’s Liam Neeson on a train thriller The Commuter (read our review here) had to settle for third, delivering $13.45 million, which is about on-par with the actor’s last collaboration with director Jaume Collet-Serra, 2015’s Run All Night, which landed with $11m.
The next three places in the chart were filled with holdovers; Insidious: The Last Key finished fourth with $12.1 million, lifting the films global tally to $92 million. Finally living up to its titular billing in fifth was The Greatest Showman, which is showing tremendous legs, dipping a minuscule 14% with an estimated $11.8 million for the three days, and heading towards $100 million with forward momentum. Star Wars: The Last Jedi slipped to sixth with $11.27 million, adding Disney dollars to a global counter that currently stands at $1.265 billion.
The saddest story of all can be found in seventh, where Paddington 2 could only manage $10.7 million, all despite a 100% rating on Rotten Tomatoes and the word-of-mouth from its success in the UK. It’s hard to know what want wrong? Was it due to Warner Bros. late acquisition of the film from The Weinstein Company debacle not affording much time for marketing, or has the Paddington brand simply not translated to North America, despite the $76 million US domestic gross of the first film?
The post-Golden Globes box-office bump meant that I, Tonya earned $3.3 million, Phantom Thread topped the per-theatre average with $18,468 and a $1.14 million weekend, and Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri made the most of it’s success with $2.3m, and a total of $28.5 million.
The estimates are likely to change when the four day Martin Luther-King Jr. weekend totals are finalised, and you can find the full chart rundown over at BoxOfficeMojo.
Until next week.