‘Kung Fu Panda 4’ tops box office for second straight weekend while ‘Dune: Part Two’ stays strong

J. Kim Murphy It’s a primate face-off at the box office this weekend, plus some old-fashioned Antichrist horror on the side. Legendary Entertainment and Warner Bros.’ “Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire” looks to stick on top of domestic charts, holding off the opening weekend bows of Universal’s beat-em-up “Monkey Man” and 20th Century Studios’ horror revival “The First Omen.” That kaiju victory lap probably has less to do with the staying power of “The New Empire” than the strength of its competition though.

Naman Ramachandran Honors were even atop the U.K. and Ireland box office as Universal’s “Kung Fu Panda 4” and Warner Bros.’ “Godzilla X Kong: The New Empire” battled for top spot during the Easter holiday weekend. While “Godzilla X Kong: The New Empire” won the three-day weekend, “Kung Fu Panda 4” had the higher gross including previews.

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Universal/DreamWorks Animation’s Kung Fu Panda 4 had a rock ‘em sock ‘em weekend at the international box office, adding $55.3M from 69 markets for a $135M overseas running cume, and $268.2M global (there are several key markets still to release, including France, Australia, the UK and Korea). 

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief ‘Kung Fu Panda 4’ opened on top of the mainland China box office in its first official week of release. But its debut was soft and led the market to one of its quietest weekends of the year. The Universal-DreamWorks Animation picture earned $14.7 million (RMB105 million) between Friday and Sunday, according to data provided by consultancy firm Artisan Gateway.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Locally-produced horror-drama “Exhuma” held on to top spot at the South Korea cinema box office for a fifth consecutive weekend. Its complete dominance of the market kept “Exhuma” comfortably ahead of the holdover “Dune 2” and a couple of lower-powered new releases and allowed its running total to surpass 10 million ticket sales. That is the conventional measure of a blockbuster in Korea, a country with a population of roughly 50 million. Over the latest weekend “Exhuma” sold 618,000 tickets for a gross revenue of $4.56 million and a market share of 56%, according to data from Kobis, the database operated by the Korean Film Council (Kofic). The latest increment gives the film a total of $73.4 million earned from 10.2 million admissions.

“Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire” collected $45.2 million in ticket sales over the weekend, according to studio estimates Sunday, handing Sony Pictures the studio’s first No. 1 film since last summer.The opening weekend for “Frozen Empire,” in 4,345 theaters, was nearly exactly the same as the $44 million launch for “Ghostbusters: Afterlife” in 2021.“Afterlife” rebooted the franchise with a sequel built around the descendants (Carrie Coon, Finn Wolfhard, Mckenna Grace) of Harold Ramis’ Egon Spengler, along with Paul Rudd’s seismologist Gary Grooberson.Neither film has been a hit with critics, but audiences have been more receptive.

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Coming out of the weekend, and with Sunday’s actuals and Monday’s numbers included, there are new global milestones to celebrate for the two major Hollywood titles currently in release.

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Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Previews for Universal Pictures and Dreamworks Animation’s “Kung Fu Panda 4” put the Chinese-themed film in fourth place at the mainland China box office, a week ahead of its official theatrical debut. Over the March 15-17 weekend, however, first and second places remained with holdover titles “The Pig, The Snake and the Pigeon” and “Dune: Part Two.” Taiwanese crime film “The Pig, The Snake and the Pigeon,” already playing on Netflix in territories outside China, topped the mainland China chart for the third successive weekend. According to data from consultancy Artisan Gateway, it earned $11.1 million (RMB79.1 million), for a cumulative of $73.2 million (RMB520 million).

With a solid offshore hold, Denis Villeneuve’s Dune: Part Two is closing in on $500M globally. The overseas weekend brought in $51.2M across 73 markets, a 40% drop versus last session (-37% excluding China). The international box office cume through Sunday is $289.4M, and worldwide the running total is $494.7M. The latter figure means the film has already surpassed Villeneuve’s 2021 Dune worldwide.

Rebecca Rubin Film and Media Reporter Universal and DreamWorks Animation’s “Kung Fu Panda 4” remained victorious at the domestic box office, collecting a solid $30 million in its second weekend of release. After 10 days on the big screen, the animated family film has grossed $107.7 million in North America and $176.5 million globally. Those ticket sales easily surpassed the debut of Mark Wahlberg’s canine drama “Arthur the King,” which opened in third place.

according to IMDB’s Box Office Mojo.. Domestically, the film’s made more than $86.5 million in its first two weeks in theaters.The Post said that Jack Black-helmed feature, “while nice enough, suggests that the smartest move would be to let the fuzzy guy retire to a calming bamboo forest rather than embark on yet another predictable adventure.”“Dune: Part Two” — director Denis Villeneuve’s epic sci-fi desert flick — managed to hold onto the #2 spot during its third week of release, taking in $8.15 million.“Arthur the King” on Friday sold more than $3 million in tickets, nabbing the No.

In a frame that will see Universal/DreamWorks Animation’s Kung Fu Panda 4 rally with a second weekend take of around $30M (-48%), three wide entries hit cinemas, the biggest being Lionsgate’s Mark Wahlberg canine sports movie Arthur the King with an eye on $8M-$10M at 3,003 locations. The movie directed by Simon Cellan Jones made $825K in previews last night, which bests the $550K previews made by Wahlberg’s 2018 movie, Instant Family, that movie opening in a very pre-pandemic, pre Thanksgiving period to $14.5M.

Rebecca Rubin Film and Media Reporter Mark Wahlberg’s canine drama “Arthur the King” opens in cinemas on Friday, but it may not have enough bite to top domestic box office charts. Lionsgate’s film, a feel-good story about a man who befriends a wounded stray dog, is targeting a debut of $8 million to $10 million from 3,000 North American theaters. It’s a so-so start for the roughly $20 million-budgeted movie.

LOS ANGELES — As Universal Pictures prepared for a big night at the Academy Awards with “Oppenheimer,” the studio also celebrated the No. 1 debut of “Kung Fu Panda 4,” which collected $58.3 million in domestic theaters over the weekend, according to estimates Sunday.“Kung Fu Panda 4,” the first film in the DreamWorks Animation franchise since the third installment in 2016, got off to a better start than all but the 2008 original.

There’s no love lost for Kung Fu Panda!

Warner Bros/Legendary Entertainment’s Dune: Part Two held strongly in its sophomore session at the international box office, adding $81M to handily cross the $200M overseas milestone, and reaching $367.5M globally.

Rebecca Rubin Film and Media Reporter “Kung Fu Panda 4” topped the domestic box office, earning a solid $58.3 million from 4,035 theaters in its opening weekend. It marks the biggest debut of the franchise since the original, 2008’s “Kung Fu Panda” ($60 million), overtaking the start of the two prior entries, 2016’s “Kung Fu Panda 3” ($41 million) and 2011’s “Kung Fu Panda 2” ($47.6 million), not adjusted for inflation. Internationally, the fourth film in the martial arts-inspired animated comedy collected $22 million from 41 markets for a global tally of $80 million.