'Ghostbusters' Wins the Weekend

Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire took the top spot at the weekend box office, coming in near the high end of its expected debut performance range. Its ticket sales were far from blockbuster level, however, and the big-budget film is unlikely to turn a profit in the end. Another horror film, Sidney Sweeney's Immaculate, had an even less auspicious debut, only managing to take fourth place for the weekend. Read on for details.

Via Variety.

“Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire” ruled over the domestic box office and arrived on the higher end of expectations.

The latest installment in Sony’s supernatural comedy series has collected $45.2 million in its debut in 4,345 North American theaters. Earlier in the weekend, “Frozen Empire” looked like it would top out with $42 million but estimates were revised up after a bigger-than-expected Sunday. At the international box office, the film ignited to a tepid $16.4 million from 25 markets for a global start of $61 million.

Still, those domestic ticket sales are just barely ahead of its 2021 predecessor, “Ghostbusters: Afterlife,” which earned $44 million to start while the box office was deep in pandemic recovery mode. It’s a sign that the 30-year-old franchise hasn’t expanded its constituency beyond the original (and aging) core fans of the business of busting ghosts.

Plus, “Frozen Empire” carries a bigger budget than the last one, costing $100 million to produce and many millions more to market. It’ll need to far outgross “Afterlife” ($204 million globally against a $75 million budget) to justify its price tag since cinema operators get to keep roughly 50% of revenues. Sony expects the movie to benefit from spring break, but “Frozen Empire” will face steep competition next weekend from “Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire.”

Critics and audiences were mixed on the sequel, which landed a 43% on Rotten Tomatoes and a “B+” CinemaScore. “Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire” follows the events of “Afterlife,” itself a sequel to the 1980s sci-fi comedy classic. (The ill-fated 2016 reboot doesn’t exist in this universe.) Franchise veterans Gil Kenan and Jason Reitman (whose father Ivan Reitman helmed 1984’s “Ghostbusters”) wrote “Frozen Empire,” which sees new recruits in the legendary ghost-catching business (Paul Rudd, Carrie Coon, Mckenna Grace and Finn Wolfhard) team up with veterans (Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd, Ernie Hudson and Annie Potts) to prevent an apocalyptic deity from igniting a second Ice Age.

This weekend’s other new release, Sydney Sweeney’s religious horror film “Immaculate,” opened in fourth place with a middling $5.3 million from 2,354 theaters. Neon backed the movie, which follows Sweeney as an American nun who joins a remote convent in the Italian countryside. But her warm welcome is interrupted after she discovers her new home harbors some dark secrets. Reviews have been so-so, while moviegoers saddled the film with a “C+” CinemaScore (which is not unusual for the horror genre).

Get the rest of the story at Variety.