New 'Lego Movie' Tries to Revive the Winter Box Office
by EG
Warner Bros. really hopes that people are eager to see another movie about Legos. The Lego Movie 2 lauches this weekend. Also new this week will be a new movie starring the suddenly embattled Liam Neeson. Read on for more weekend previews.
After a dismal January and a blowout over Super Bowl weekend, the 2019 domestic box office hopes to regain its stride this weekend in advance of Valentine's Day and the long Presidents Day holiday.
The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part is poised to climb to the top of the chart with a $50 million-$55 million debut. The family-friendly pic opens five years after The Lego Movie, directed by Phil Lord and Christopher Miller, became a brick-by-brick sensation at the box office, creating a new CG-animated franchise for Warner Bros. that has included two spinoffs (The Lego Batman Movie and The Lego Ninjago Movie, both released in 2017).
Mike Mitchell directs Lego Movie 2, with Lord and Miller returning as writers and producers. Chris Pratt, Elizabeth Bank, Will Arnett, Charlie Day, Alison Brie, Nick Offerman and Will Ferrell reprise their roles, while new additions to the voice cast include Tiffany Haddish, Stephanie Beatriz and Maya Rudolph.
Set five years after construction worker Emmet Brickowski (Pratt) and company emerge victorious over the evil Lord Business (Ferrell), the story finds the decidedly more infantile DUPLO invaders making good on their previous threat to reduce their beloved Bricksburg to a pile of rubble, dubbed Apocalypseburg.
Paramount and producer Will Packer's What Men Want could also impress. Directed by Adam Shankman, the pic is a gender-bending redo of Nancy Meyer's 2000 comedy, What Women Want which starred Mel Gibson and Helen Hunt. Tracking suggests What Men Want will open in the $18 million-$24 million range.
Get the rest of the story at The Hollywood Reporter.
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