Box Office: 22 Jump Street Registers Second-Highest Opening For R-Rated Comedy

Box Office, Columns, News, Top Story

Summer 2014 has been slow. Big movies are arriving en masse and it is causing a bottleneck in theaters. While the likes of The Amazing Spider-Man 2, Godzilla and X-Men: Days of Future Past have amassed big earnings, none of them will make it above $250 million domestic. Considering the international push of Hollywood titles, where foreign grosses account for nearly 70% of total earnings, movies making less than $250 million stateside is not surprising. Only The Lego Movie and Captain America: The Winter Soldier have achieved that status this year. Part of that success is their arrival in theaters came back in February and April, during a period where the marketplace isn’t as crowded.

Steven Spielberg and George Lucas may be attributed with the creation of the modern blockbuster with Jaws and the Star Wars franchise, but today’s Hollywood seems to want to cater to generation ADD with a devil may care attitude to variety. I was troubled when I learned that in the next four years we will have twenty-three superhero movies coming out in theaters. 23! We’re looking at almost six superhero movies a year. Now before you ask, But Travis, what if all of them are great? Wishful thinking. The problem stems with studios wanting to follow Marvel Entertainment’s template years after the independent studio with Disney ties perfected the formula, which involves synergy in different mediums. This can have negative implications, however, like the whole Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. television series having to have its storylines reflect the events that developed in Captain America: The Winter Soldier. Marvel’s model, even when it comes to its films, is very much like television. Kevin Feige is essentially the showrunner with different directors occupying the captain chair on individual productions. This means a lack of a director’s vision to the project, thus Edgar Wright’s recent departing of the Ant-Man project.

Ah well, at least he can always say he knew Chris Evans before he was Captain America.

As box office fatigue sets in, the good news is the weekend was led by two films of non-loud or epic caliber that took in $110 million overall. This is good news for Phil Lord and Chris Miller as the two have rivaled all other directors this year so far. February saw the release of their animated hit The LEGO Movie ($256 million domestically, $462m globally), and now they have the #1 spot again with the release of 22 Jump Street. The sequel to the 2012 hit comedy opened to an incredible $60 million and recorded the second-highest R-rated comedy opening ever (behind The Hangover Part II) and the fifth-highest R-Rated film opening ever, just above 2001’s Hannibal. Scott Sawitz and I may disagree on its final grade – I liked it a bit more than him, despite its repetitiveness and length (Ice Cube and the end credit sequence are the biggest highlights) – it is a much better sequel than what we got with The Hangover franchise. The opening (66% higher than 21 Jump Street) is a good indicator that the film’s success during Spring 2012 and on home video gave it quite a following. The first only made $138 million and this sequel will easily pass that mark, as I foresee this one will be in the top five for a number of weeks as it looks to have legs and strong replayability.

Also performing strong is How to Train Your Dragon 2, a sequel that arrives four years after the first opened in Spring 2010. Its opening may have only been up 14.4% from the original, but with merchandising (don’t know what that is – watch Yogurt below) and no animated movies on the horizon until July 18th (Planes: Fire & Rescue), Toothless and the gang can keep raking in the cash.

Angelina Jolie’s showing that it pays to be bad, or just really, really, really misunderstood. Maleficent was the highest debut of her career and like the Energizer bunny (is that too old of a pop culture reference for you?) her film keeps going and going. Worldwide in three weeks it is sitting at $436 million and it should eclipse $500 million in short order – maybe even higher once it opens in China and Japan. A sequel is all but guaranteed, but how much story is left to be told?

Edge of Tomorrow may not have opened to big numbers, but the good news is that because of this it didn’t drop huge in terms of attendance. Tom Cruise is a global superstar and internationally the sci-fi actioneer is just below $240 million. Good word of mouth is helping this feature, no doubt, something that didn’t occur with Cruise’s last sci-fi outing, Oblivion .

The Fault In Our Stars was frontloaded to the hilt so it’s not surprising that it took a big tumble a week after topping the list. Dropping to fourth, and losing 67.2% of its first-week audience in the process, the $12 million feature based on John Green’s bestseller is sitting strong with $81 million in two weeks. $100 million is an easy goal to obtain and it will likely be purchased many times over when it hits home video. My guess would be September right around Labor Day.

X-Men: Days of Future Past and Godzilla are still doing their thing, but I’m bored by bringing them up on a weekly basis. Seriously, I just wish they were gone so we can talk about something else. Like the Seth Rogen and Zac Efron comedy Neighbors (closing in on $150 million). The success of this frat comedy makes up for the Universal Studios misfire that was Seth MacFarlane’s A Million Ways to Die in the West (aka “The MacFarlane Vanity Project.”) Maybe MacFarlane will have a rebound when the Ted sequel arrives and we’ll get to see Mila Kunis on screen instead of have her be a “toke”-n phrase when MacFarlane enjoys most of the peace pipe he’s been offered. Better still is Jon Favreau’s Chef as the best counter-programming to the malaise that comes with summer blockbusters. The charming comedy has made $14 million and a great model of the limited-to-wide platform release. Not bad for Open Road Films doing something that Fox Searchlight has done multiple times (see the performance of The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel).


01. 22 Jump Street — $60,000,000
02. How to Train Your Dragon 2 — $50,000,000
03. Maleficent — $19,008,000 ($163,525,000)
04. Edge of Tomorrow — $16,175,000 ($56,649,000)
05. The Fault In Our Stars — $15,725,000 ($81,700,000)
06. X-Men: Days Of Future Past — $9,500,000 ($205,940,000)
07. Godzilla — $3,155,000 ($191,301,000)
08. A Million Ways to Die in the West — $3,077,000 ($38,937,000)
09. Neighbors — $2,484,000 ($143,137,000)
10. Chef — $2,276,000 ($14,076,000)

Travis Leamons is one of the Inside Pulse Originals and currently holds the position of Managing Editor at Inside Pulse Movies. He's told that the position is his until he's dead or if "The Boss" can find somebody better. I expect the best and I give the best. Here's the beer. Here's the entertainment. Now have fun. That's an order!