Lego Movie 2 takes $1.91m at weekend box office, well behind Captain Marvel
The Lego Movie 2’s debut was overshadowed by the continuing box office dominance of Captain Marvel over the weekend.
Captain Marvel’s $3.88m in takings across 645 screens dwarfed The Lego Movie 2 which earned $1.91m from 391 screens nationally while wrestling biopic Fighting With My Family took $1.22m from the 319 venues where it appeared.
Being beaten by a superhero movie is history repeating for the Lego movie franchise with the original’s debut falling behind a Captain America sequel in 2014.
After the disappointing Australian performance of the first Lego movie, Village Roadshow boss Graham Burke conceded the distributor had made ‘a hell of a mistake’ holding back the local release date following widespread criticism.
The other weekend debut, Fighting With My Family, loosely follows the real-life story of English WWF wrestler Saraya-Jade Bevis who became the youngest champion in the title’s history at the age of 21.
The movie, released at the Sundance Film Festival in January, has been on US and European screens since early February.
The weekend’s earnings take Captain Marvel’s total revenue to $31.6m since its debut three weeks ago, making it the highest grossing movie released so far in 2019.
Bohemian Rhapsody, the highest grossing movie still showing on Australian movie screens, earned $99,250 from 52 screens. Since its launch last November, the Freddie Mercury biopic has taken $54.8m from Australian movie-goers.
Hotel Mumbai and A Dog’s Way Home also cracked the the top five movies earning $632,342 from 273 screens and $350,000 from 256 screens respectively.
| Title (Distributor) | Weekend B/O | Screens | Total B/O |
|---|---|---|---|
| Captain Marvel (Disney) | $3,881,160 | 645 | $31,642,971 |
| The Lego Movie 2 (Wb) | $1,913,942 | 391 | $3,822,630 |
| Fighting With My Family (Universal) | $1,219,201 | 319 | $1,646,953 |
| Hotel Mumbai (Icon) | $632,342 | 273 | $2,061,812 |
| A Dog's Way Home (Sony) | $350,345 | 256 | $4,023,751 |
| Green Book (Eone) | $337,507 | 243 | $13,341,390 |
| Kesari (Zee Studios) | $307,226 | 49 | $307,226 |
| Destroyer (Madman) | $194,751 | 70 | $263,218 |
| Swimming With Men (Icon) | $193,858 | 138 | $333,054 |
| Star Is Born, A (Wb) | $166,058 | 127 | $36,427,190 |
| Sometimes Always Never (Transmission) | $148,054 | 82 | $566,255 |
| Alita: Battle Angel (Fox) | $132,389 | 127 | $10,927,437 |
| Bohemian Rhapsody (Fox) | $99,250 | 52 | $54,861,201 |
| More Than Blue (Chinalion Film) | $98,638 | 20 | $288,941 |
| What Men Want (Paramount) | $91,057 | 91 | $5,827,733 |
| Greta (Universal) | $66,481 | 82 | $1,361,526 |
| Joni 75: A Birthday Celebration (Trafalgar) | $53,438 | 22 | $53,438 |
| King Of Thieves (Studiocanal) | $47,812 | 133 | $1,818,273 |
| Stan And Ollie (Eone) | $44,857 | 132 | $2,342,217 |
| Everybody Knows (Universal) | $43,993 | 24 | $539,967 |
“Our policy going forward is that all our movies will be released within the time and date of the United States.” Graham Burke, 2014
LEGO Movie 2 US release date – February 8
LEGO Movie 2 AUS release date – March 28
User ID not verified.
WB gave Village Roadshow the elbow as co-producer of the Lego movies after the breakout success of the first one. So that lag might just a reflect a certain ambivalence towards the franchise.
User ID not verified.
A brief internet search would tell you that the movie has been all over the internet the last 2 weeks.
So is the small box office Marvels fault or that the internet found a better way to distribute the product? We’ll never know – but I’m pretty sure Roadshow will blame piracy (again).
User ID not verified.
The fools need to remember Australia is one of the largest media pirates, and for this exact reason. I pirated Lego Movie 2 over a month ago because I didn’t want my kids to be upset because they though it would be an international release.
User ID not verified.