4-Day Weekend Box Office Predictions
January 12 - January 15, 2024
Published on January 11, 2024 at 8:00PM Pacific |
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| Paramount's Mean Girls will look to deliver the first significant opening weekend performance of 2024 this weekend over the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday frame. The musical comedy directed by
Samantha Jayne and Arturo Perez Jr. is an adaptation of the Mean Girls stage musical, which was an adaptation of the 2004 Mean Girls film. The new edition of Mean Girls stars an ensemble cast that features
Angourie Rice, Reneé Rapp, Auli'i Cravalho, Jaquel Spivey, Avantika, Bebe Wood, Christopher Briney, Tina Fey and Tim Meadows. Mean Girls is playing in 3,791 locations this weekend, has Thursday preview shows beginning at 4PM and
also had select early access shows on Wednesday. Mean Girls had previously been planned as a Paramount+ streaming release, but the plan to go with a theatrical launch instead looks like it will pay off this weekend. On the
average, critical reviews for Mean Girls have been fairly average. 2004's Mean Girls debuted with $24.43 million and went on to finish its domestic run with $86.06 million. The original film has maintained quite a
following over the years, which looks to have helped build up interest for the new version of Mean Girls. Mean Girls could potentially perform similar to fellow Paramount release Scream, which had respective
three-day and four-day debuts of $30.02 million and $33.86 million over Martin Luther King Jr. weekend back in 2022. BoxOfficeReport is predicting respective three-day and four-day holiday starts of $27.7 million and $31.5 million for Mean Girls. |
| Also opening in wide release this weekend is Amazon MGM Studio's The Beekeeper. The David Ayer directed action thriller stars Jason Statham and also features Emmy Raver-Lampman, Josh Hutcherson,
Bobby Naderi, Minnie Driver, Phylicia Rashad and Jeremy Irons. The Beekeeper will be playing in 3,303 locations this weekend, will be playing on IMAX screens and has Thursday preview shows beginning early at 2PM. The film also
looks to be receiving more than one screen at many theatres this weekend. Statham led films can be hit or miss at the box office, but there looks to be a decent amount of pre-release anticipation for The Beekeeper. Similar to
Mean Girls, critical reviews for The Beekeeper have been fairly average on the average. Last year over Martin Luther King Jr. weekend, Plane had respective three-day and four-day starts of $10.27 million and
$11.84 million. The Beekeeper may open a bit higher than Plane did, thanks in part to the IMAX boost. BoxOfficeReport is predicting that The Beekeeper will debut in second place this weekend with respective
three-day and four-day starts of $12.8 million and $14.5 million. |
| It could potentially be a tight race for third place this weekend between Warner Bros.'s Wonka and Sony's Anyone But You. While Wonka had quite the edge over Anyone But You over the
holidays, Anyone But You has continued to hold up especially well throughout its run and even moved ahead of Wonka for first place at the daily box office from Monday through Wednesday this week. Anyone But You could
have the slight advantage over Wonka over the three-day frame this weekend, but Wonka could in turn have the slight advantage over the four-day frame, as films that appeal to family audiences traditionally hold up very nicely
on Martin Luther King Jr. Day. Anyone But You should continue to hold up very well this weekend as the film could gross $8.9 million over the three-day weekend (which would be a slim decline of 8.7 percent from last weekend) and gross
$10.8 million over the four-day weekend (which would be a 10.8 percent increase over last weekend's three-day gross). Wonka could decline a solid 38.2 percent over the three-day frame to gross $8.7 million and could take in
$11.2 million over the four-day weekend (which would represent a 20.4 percent decrease from last weekend's three-day gross). |
| Each of the past two weekends Warner Bros.'s Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom and Universal and DreamWorks Animation's Migration have been close to one another in the rankings, with
Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom ultimately remaining ahead of Migration both frames. While the two films should remain close this weekend, Migration is likely to finally go ahead of
Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom in the weekend rankings, due in part to the mentioned trend of family films typically having strong Monday holds on Martin Luther King Jr. Day. Migration could gross $6.3 million over the
three-day frame this weekend (which would be a 37.0 percent decline from last weekend) to take fifth place and could gross $8.3 million over the four-day frame (which would be down just 17.0 percent from last weekend's three-day performance).
Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom could follow in sixth place with $5.9 million over the three-day weekend (which would be a respectable decline of 44.3 percent) and could gross $7.3 million over the four-day frame
(which would be a 31.1 percent decrease from last weekend's three-day take). |
| This weekend also sees the wide release of Sony and Legendary's The Book of Clarence. The biblical comedy was directed by Jeymes Samuel and features an ensemble cast that includes LaKeith Stanfield,
Omar Sy, RJ Cyler, Anna Diop, David Oyelowo, Micheal Ward, Alfre Woodard, Teyana Taylor, Caleb McLaughlin, Marianne Jean-Baptiste, James McAvoy and Benedict Cumberbatch. Jay-Z is one of the film's producers. The Book of Clarence is
playing in 2,010 locations this weekend and has Thursday preview shows beginning at 3PM. On the average, critical reviews for The Book of Clarence have been good, but not great. As a biblical comedy, The Book of Clarence will
likely be a tough sell at the box office. Perhaps the film will receive a bit of a boost this weekend from opening over Martin Luther King Jr. weekend. BoxOfficeReport is predicting respective three-day and four-day debuts of
$4.1 million and $4.8 million for The Book of Clarence, which would likely place the film in the same neighborhood this weekend as the second weekend performance of Universal's Night Swim; BoxOfficeReport is predicting
respective three-day and four-day grosses of $4.4 million and $5.2 million for Night Swim this weekend. |
| Also of note this weekend are Disney's theatrical release of Pixar's Soul (in 1,350 locations) and Amazon MGM Studios' expansion of American Fiction to a moderate 625 locations. Soul, which
was released domestically on Disney+ back in December of 2020, will be playing in theatres for the first time nationwide. However, the release is very scaled back, along the lines of more recent re-issue releases from Disney. Disney
will also be giving theatrical releases to Pixar's Turning Red on February 9 and to Pixar's Luca on March 22 (both of which also originally debuted on Disney+ domestically). The critically acclaimed American Fiction has
grossed a promising $3.23 million through 27 days of platform release and should continue to have a presence at the box office upon expanding to moderate release this weekend. BoxOfficeReport isn't making an official prediction for either
Soul or American Fiction this weekend. |
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4-Day predictions for this weekend's top 9 films at the domestic box office.
| Rank | Film (Distributor) | Weekend Gross |
Total Gross |
% Change |
Week # |
| 1 | Mean Girls (Paramount) |
$31.5 M | $31.5 M | NEW | 1 |
| 2 | The Beekeeper (Amazon MGM Studios) |
$14.5 M | $14.5 M | NEW | 1 |
| 3 | Wonka (Warner Bros.) |
$11.2 M | $179.0 M | -20% | 5 |
| 4 | Anyone But You (Sony / Columbia) |
$10.8 M | $59.0 M | +11% | 4 |
| 5 | Migration (Universal) |
$8.3 M | $87.9 M | -17% | 4 |
| 6 | Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom (Warner Bros.) |
$7.3 M | $110.3 M | -31% | 4 |
| 7 | Night Swim (Universal) |
$5.2 M | $19.8 M | -57% | 2 |
| 8 | The Book of Clarence (Sony / TriStar) |
$4.8 M | $4.8 M | NEW | 1 |
| 9 | The Boys in the Boat (Amazon MGM Studios) |
$4.4 M | $40.2 M | -21% | 3 |
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