Sunday, October 20, 2019



Variety

An indication for optimism: the follow-up had a far stronger opening overseas, where it collected $117 million over the weekend, pushing its global bounty to $153 million. Outside of the domestic market, “Maleficent: Mistress of Evil” posted the biggest launch in China with $22.4 million, marking a 15% increase in ticket sales from the original. Another promising sign is the first movie earned $500 million internationally, twice what “Maleficent” made in the States. The film ended its box office run with a mighty $758 million globally.
Box office watchers point out that “Maleficent: Mistress of Evil” arrived on the big screen five years after the original, allowing audience interest to diminish before the second entry premiered. The sequel received poor reviews from critics, suggesting to moviegoers that they might be better off waiting to see the film when it inevitably hits Disney Plus, the studio’s forthcoming streaming service.
Although it received mostly negative critical sentiment, ticket buyers who did show up on opening weekend were enthusiastic about “Maleficent: Mistress of Evil,” and positive word of mouth could point to a long life in theaters as Halloween nears. While “Maleficent 2” holds a 40% Rotten Tomatoes average from movie reviewers, the PG movie scored an A CinemaScore and a strong 96% average among moviegoers on Rotten Tomatoes.
“We’re optimistic about the overall performance,” said Cathleen Taff, Disney’s president of global distribution. “With great word of mouth, audiences will gravitate to the film.”
Taff adds, “Given the competition in China with ‘Gemini Man’ and local projects, we’re ecstatic about the results there.”
 “Disney has one of the deepest benches, to put it mildly,” Dergarabedian said. “They have so many big films on the way. To me, it’s not always about the opening weekend. What pays the bills is where you are at the end of your run.”




Disney’s Maleficent: Mistress Of Evil came within, but on the low end, of pre-weekend industry projections with $117M at the international box office. Counting the disappointing domestic opening of $36M, the global debut is $153M.
Heading into the launch session, the industry was seeing a $115M-$125M overseas start for the Angelina Jolie sequel. The result is above the original’s 2014 opening of $109M in like-for-like markets and at today’s rates — just a roughly 7% bump.
The film did see upswings in weekend play and with good audience scores — plus, there’s nothing in the way in the coming weeks, apart from local product, until Disney’s own Frozen II in November. Disney’s President Theatrical Distribution, Franchise Management and Business & Audience Insights, Cathleen Taff tells Deadline the film, which saw piçk-up on Saturday and Sunday, “seems to be connecting with fans and we are looking to have word of mouth propel a good run.”
But there are some problem areas here. In Japan, a mixture of factors worked against the picture this weekend. First and foremost is Joker which provided villainous competition, jumping 36% from last session to become the No. 2 DC movie ever in the market at $25.3M.
Japan was the top overseas hub for Maleficent, and in 2014 took over No. 1 from Disney’s own Frozen which had held the spot for 16 weeks at the time. This weekend, Joker gave the evil mistress a run for her money. Other factors in Japan this frame include lingering effects from last weekend’s devastating typhoon, and today’s Rugby World Cup quarter final which was played this evening local time with the home team in contention.
While China was a tangled web this weekend with local title The Captain and Japanese entry One Piece: Stampede making a run, and Gemini Man having a longer lead-time to market, Maleficent did come in No. 1 at $22.4M. That’s 15% above the original, but a finish just on par with that film is portended. Maleficent 2 has a 6.2 on reviews aggregator Douban, though a better 9.1 on Maoyan. China was No. 2 on Maleficent The First.
As we noted in our global preview, the first Maleficent finaled at $517M abroad, although translated to today that would be about $380M given currency swings in the intervening period. (That movie also had benefited from counter programming against the soccer World Cup.)
Maleficent did scrum strong in Russia with $10.7M for the second highest ever Disney Live Action opening, behind only The Lion King. Largely across Europe (outside Italy among majors), Mistress Of Evil was No. 2 behind Joker.





Maleficent: Mistress Of Evil produced $117m internationally and $153m worldwide as China led the way on an estimated $22.4m over three days, ranking number one to finish +15% ahead of the 2014 debut by Maleficent.

Russia generated $10.7m, Mexico $7.8m, Indonesia $4.8m, Italy $4.7m, South Korea $4.6m, Brazil $4.5m, the UK $4.3m, and France $3.9m.

The fantasy adventure starring Angelina Jolie, Elle Fanning and Michelle Pfeiffer ranks number one in Europe in Russia, Italy, Poland, Czech Republic, Israel, Middle East, and Ukraine, and second behind Joker in most other markets.

Indonesia delivered the second highest Disney live-action debut of all time, and the highest Disney live-action debut in Thailand, and the third highest in Malaysia and Taiwan. It ranks number one in Brazil, Mexico and seven other Latin American markets.



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