‘Ghostbusters’ Franchise Heading To $1 Billion With ‘Frozen Empire’; Sydney Sweeney Nun Movie ‘Immaculate’ Also Going Wide – Box Office Preview
19.03.2024 - 21:45
/ deadline.com
Sony’s $100M sequel to Ghostbusters: Afterlife— Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire— is looking at an opening at $45M, give or take. The previous installment, released during the pandemic in 2021, which was directed by Jason Reitman and produced by the late Ghostbusters filmmaker Ivan Reitman, opened to $44M and legged out to $129M domestic. Currently through four movies the Ghostbusters franchise stands at $945.2M; the fifth title will easily put the brand past the $1 billion mark if not this weekend, shortly thereafter.
Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire is playing at 4,300 theaters and will have all the PLFs and a majority of the Imax screens (some will still be playing Dune: Part Two). Previews start at 2PM Thursday in roughly 3,600 locations. Essentially, what we have here is more theatrical product serving the spring break audience, this Friday seeing 15% K-12 schools off and 15% colleges on break per Comscore. On Good Friday, March 29, these numbers skyrocket to 77% K-12 schools and 39% colleges on break.
Overseas, Frozen Empire is going in 25 markets this weekend representing about 55% of international. Top markets are the UK, Mexico, Australia, Spain, and Germany.
Ghostbusters: Afterlife was a reboot set on reinvigorating the comedy series with his die-hard male fans after an attempt was made by Sony to do an all-female comedy in 2016 with Kate McKinnon, Melissa McCarthy, Kristen Wiig and Leslie Jones. That opened to $46M and actually finaled at $128.3M domestic. Despite those good numbers that movie wasn’t well received by the fans with a CinemaScore of B+.
The Reitman reboot –which co-stars original cast members Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd and Ernie Hudson–was promptly hailed by exhibition who watched it at August