The launch of Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation outperformed forecasts by a significant margin.
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Amy Schumer’s racy comedy “Trainwreck“, directed by Judd Apatow, about a boozy commitment-phobe who’s finally pinned down by a smitten doctor, fell to sixth place with US$9.7 million.
In fourth place, Universal Pictures’ animated hit “Minions” added about $12.2 million.
Rogue Nation was produced by Cruise, J.J. Abrams, Bryan Burk, Dana Goldberg, Don Granger, and David Ellison.
The second film, Mission Impossible II, opened over Memorial Day weekend in 2000 with $70.8 million ($57 million from the weekend itself). The Adam Sandler comedy “Pixels” came in fifth. Each Mission: Impossible has employed a different director. “We’ll probably start shooting it next summer”.
Paramount Pictures vice chairman Rob Moore is ready for more Ethan Hunt, strongly endorsing Tom Cruise’s recent announcement that Mission: Impossible 6 is in the works. Barring any unforeseen circumstances, the movie is projected to take the No. 1 spot with little opposition, as the movie coasted on the strength of its male-driven audience, in addition to the continued star power of Tom Cruise.
The star pulled off a turnaround after a string of underperforming films, including Jack Reacher and Edge of Tomorrow, and managed to sidestep awkward questions about his belief in Scientology. However, positive word of mouth helped propel it to higher grosses.
That’s why Hollywood is betting that its long-running movie franchises, comic book series and action adventures will draw the biggest audiences. The 2005 movie “Bewitched”, which had a meta plotline involving actors filming a “Bewitched” remake, didn’t do well either.
The overall box office for the weekend is down significantly compared with the same weekend a year ago when Disney/Marvel’s “Guardians of the Galaxy” opened with a stunning US$94.3 million weekend.
The action-thriller raked in $56 million in its inaugural weekend, according to box office tracker Exhibitor Relations. He scaled the world’s tallest building in 2011’s Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol, and hangs off the plane this time.
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Rentrak senior media analyst Paul Dergarabedian is not surprised that Paramount has decided to make another Mission: Impossible movie.
