Despite a drop of over 50% between weekend box office grosses, The Hunger Games: Mockingjay—Part 1, the latest entry in the young adult dystopia film series, once again took the top spot at the domestic weekend box office, repeating its opening weekend feat. While making only $56.8 million over the three days, the film benefitted from an overall dip in box office revenue, which is down about 20% from the same weekend in 2013. With two weekends in theatres under its belt, forecasters are also beginning to get a clearer picture of how well the movie might do by the end of the year, and while it is going to leave a mark, the film seems unlikely to dethrone this summer’s Guardians of the Galaxy as the top grossing domestic film. With the latter film sitting at $331 million, The Hunger Games: Mockingjay—Part 1 has a ways to go to catch up, currently having grossed $225 million.
The second spot of the box office charts belongs to a newcomer, as Penguins of Madagascar made its debut with a haul of $25.8 million. The Dreamworks spinoff of the Madagascar franchise beat out animated rival Big Hero 6, which nonetheless proved its staying power with a third place finish, ending the weekend with $18.6 million. The weekend’s other major release, Horrible Bosses 2, landed at number 5 with a total of $15.7 million, handily beating sixth place finisher Dumb and Dumber To, as the former box office champion continues to drop. Dropping out of the top ten altogether this week are Fury and Beyond the Lights.
The big performer among the limited releases opening this weekend was The Imitation Game. The biopic of Alan Turing, which won the People’s Choice Award at the 2014 Toronto International Film Festival, made $482,071 from just four theatres, with a per screen average of $120,518. The other key limited release of the week was the acclaimed Sundance horror film The Babadook, which made $27,000 in three theatres for a per screen average of $9,000 to go with its VOD totals.
The top earners at the US box office for the weekend is as follows:
- The Hunger Games: Mockingjay—Part 1 — $56,875,000
- Penguins of Madagascar — $25,800,000
- Big Hero 6 — $18,770,000
- Interstellar — $15,800,000
- Horrible Bosses 2 — $15,700,000
- Dumb and Dumber To — $8,295,000
- The Theory of Everything — $5,082,000
- Gone Girl — $2,470,000
- Birdman — $1,880,000
- St. Vincent — $1,773,000