Star Trek Beyond has topped the USA box office chart after taking $59.9m (£45.6m) on its opening weekend. For instance, Into Darkness opening at the start of the summer movie season could have meant people were more amped for it, as opposed to a late July release, when people are sort of worn out by all the sequels and blockbusters.
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The original Star Trek reboot in 2009 garnered an impressive $75.2 million (£57.2 million), while 2013’s Star Trek Into Darkness opened with $70.2 million (£54.4 million).
In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, it was revealed that Simon Pegg, who plays Scott Montgomery and also co-wrote the Star Trek Beyond film, and director Justin Lin thought that this would be a homage to George Takei as a sci-fi icon and LGBT activist.
For its part, Warner Bros found another low-budget horror hit in Lights Out, but 20th Century Fox’s fifth Ice Age collapsed. The last movie in the series, “Ice Age: Continental Drift”, took in $715 million from foreign markets while grossing $161 million in North America. Bones (Karl Urban) and Spock (Quinto) are injured, Kirk (Pine) and Chekov (Anton Yelschin) make it their mission to find the Enterprise’s saucer, while Sulu (John Cho), Uhura (Saldana) and the rest of the crew are captured by Krall.
It’s not quite as good a weekend for Ice Age: Collision as the kids fare movie underperformed (as expected) as The Secret Life of Pets took the second place spot with $29.3 million.
If the film can conquer China – not unlike how “Terminator: Genisys” and “Warcraft” were saved overseas – then “Star Trek” will safely continue its four-decade cinematic mission.
I’m going to be honest and say that I didn’t expect to like this film as much as I did. If that estimate holds, Pets will have earned around $260 million in its first 17 days, not counting overseas receipts, which will push the film over $300 million this weekend, according to Forbes. I predict that next weekend Ghostbusters will pass $100 million domestically.
Rounding out the top five, Ghostbusters and the micro-budget chiller Lights Out both earned $21.6 million, tying for fourth place.
The Film Arcade’s “Don’t Think Twice” bowed to $90,126 in a single location, representing the year’s highest per-screen average.
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As for next week, Jason Bourne is back, and he knows everything. again.
