After two rather strange weeks in theaters, the box office took a fantastic turn. A fantastic beasty turn, that is.
Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, the hotly anticipated Harry Potter prequel, broke out in a big way in North America, stuffing an estimated $75 million into its curiously expansive marsupial pouch. It wasn’t the fantastic debut that some expected: A few prognosticators thought the flick had a chance to collect $100 million this weekend. But No. 1 was never in doubt. Because, really, who’s going to stand in the way of an erumpent?
In the face of that Fantastic Beast onslaught, every other movie was pretty much an afterthought. Indeed, the rest of the Top Five looks exactly like last week’s Top Five—only with everyone moving down a notch.
Two-time defending champ Doctor Strange slid to No. 2 with $17.7 million. The animated Trolls continued to scurry behind Strange, nearly besting the Marvel superhero with $17.5 million. Arrival ($11.8 million) and Almost Christmas ($7 million) finished fourth and fifth respectively.
Those holdovers, plus sixth-place Hacksaw Ridge ($6.8 million) helped to spoil a host of new-movie debuts. The Edge of Seventeen had a miserable coming out party, earning just $4.8 million to finish seventh. The boxing flick Bleed for This was knocked down in the very first round, pocketing just $2.4 million for eighth. And Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk barely got moving. Despite an aggressive national expansion, the movie earned slightly less than $1 million to finish 14th.
Lower down the chart, we see evidence that awards season is beginning to warm up. Moonlight and Loving, two Oscar hopefuls, both expanded into more theaters and earned $1.6 million and $850,000 respectively. Nocturnal Animals debuted in just 37 theaters and earned about a half million. Another newcomer, Manchester by the Sea, earned about $240,000 in four theaters.
Final figures update: 1. Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, $74.4 million; 2. Doctor Strange, $17.8 million; 3. Trolls, $17.4 million; 4. Arrival, $12.1 million; 5. Almost Christmas, $7.3 million.
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