Queen is one of those bands that everyone sings along with when one of their trademark tunes comes on the radio. So it should come as no surprise that a rock biopic bearing the title of one of their most famous songs topped the box office last weekend.
Bohemian Rhapsody, the story of the unique rock band Queen and their energetic frontman Freddie Mercury, landed at the top of the box office this weekend. While projections had the movie making somewhere in the mid-$30 million range, the rock biopic exceeded expectations impressively with $50 million. But how did the rest of the box office openers fare?
Box Office Mojo has the weekend box office numbers, which show that audiences weren’t put off by the lukewarm reception from critics. That’s likely because of the draw of Queen and the power of their discography bringing them into theaters. After all, even the bad reviews praised Rami Malek‘s performance in the lead as Freddie Mercury. In fact, Bohemian Rhapsody earned an “A” CinemaScore, which means audiences were pretty satisfied with the film, not to mention the fact that it played to both men and women and multi-generational crowds.
It seems like udiences got exactly what they wanted from a Queen biopic, but critics weren’t impressed because of all the biopic cliches and tropes present in the film. After seeing Bohemian Rhapsody, I knew it was going to be huge with Queen fans, even though it’s not necessarily the story this band deserves. It hits all of the expected beats that this kind of music biopic has in the past, but after Walk Hard sent up those tropes magnificently, critics expect more from a movie like this. Meanwhile, most general audiences just wanted to tap their feet along to Queen’s long list of hits and relive their glory days.
Meanwhile, The Nutcracker and the Four Realms landed on the lower side of expectations with $20 million, earning them a second place finish. With the movie racking up a 41% on Rotten Tomatoes and only a satisfactory B+ Cinema Score from audiences, it’s no surprise that the movie isn’t pulling in nearly as much interest as the usual Disney release.
Finally, Paramount Pictures debuted their R-rated comedy Nobody’s Fool with a respectable $14 million. That’s not bad for an R-rated comedy directed by Tyler Perry and starring Tiffany Haddish, especially with audiences giving it an A- CinemaScore.
With new releases taking the top three spots at the box office, A Star Is Born impressively stayed high on the charts in the #4 spot with another $11.1 million, making the US total $165 million. The movie certainly has long legs, and if it gets as much awards attention as expected, it’s bound to stick around in the coming weeks. It might even end up getting a second wide release as we get closer to the Oscars.
The top five was rounded out by Halloween, which earned another $11 million. The drop from the second weekend was a little steeper than expected, but that’s not surprising since it’s officially November and everyone is moving on to Thanksgiving and Christmas after the Halloween season. Still, the movie has pulled in over $150 million in the US, and that’s huge for a horror sequel
Interestingly enough, Venom is staying strong on the box office charts in the #6 spot. After licking up another $7.85 million this past weekend, the domestic total stands at $198.6 million, which means it will surpass the $200 million milestone sometime later this week. That’s surprising for a movie that was lambasted endlessly by critics, but Venom’s tongue knows no limits.
The box office gets a few more contenders this coming weekend with The Grinch arriving well ahead of Christmas, and both Overlord and The Girl in the Spider’s Web bringing two different kinds of thrills and action to the big screen. How will they fare against the holdovers? We’ll find out next weekend.
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