‘Jurassic World’ and ‘Inside Out’ Top ‘Terminator: Genisys’ and ‘Magic Mike XXL’

Terminator: Genisys

Terminator: Genisys

This July 4th holiday weekend, the blockbuster dino movie Jurassic World and the animated flick about feelings, Inside Out, topped Terminator: Genisys and Magic Mike XXL at the box office, though Terminator: Genisys had a strong international showing.

Counting just the three-day-long July 4th holiday weekend, Jurassic World roared in at first place at the domestic box office, with gross ticket sales of $30.9 million. Inside Out continued to do strong at the box office, coming in at Number Two, with a domestic gross that was not far behind, at $30.1 million. Terminator: Genisys under-performed, with the Arnold Schwarzenegger vehicle just taking in a domestic gross of $28.7 million, coming in third place, though it came in at Number One internationally, raking in $74 million overseas.

If the past five days are taken into account, Inside Out bested Jurassic World, with a domestic gross of $45.3 million compared to the $43.8 million that Jurassic World took in. Also, even though Jurassic World is currently ahead of Inside Out when just the three-day Fourth of July weekend is taken into consideration, they are so close in earnings that when the final numbers are released on Monday, Inside Out might switch positions with Jurassic World and be declared the Number One flick of the holiday weekend.

Magic Mike XXL was another movie that debuted over the Fourth of July weekend that was expected to perform solidly at the box office. However, the Warner Brothers flick wound in in fourth place, with a domestic gross of just $12 million, only a million dollars higher in ticket sales than the fifth place finisher, Seth MacFarlane’s Ted 2.

Despite the relatively lackluster debuts of Terminator: Genisys and Magic Mike XXL, according to Rentrak, the weekend was the 12th-biggest Fourth of July weekend ever in domestic ticket sales, coming in at 5 percent higher than last year’s dismal showing. Last year was the worst that the box office has done since 2001. In 2014, the biggest movies debuting were Deliver Us From Evil and Tammy.

With 2015 seeing the debuts of blockbusters like Avengers: Age of Ultron, Furious 7 and Jurassic World, a report by BoxOffice.com states that ticket sales are up 13.3 percent compared to 2014. That was even though Memorial Day was a flop, with George Clooney’s Tomorrowland bombing, and now, Terminator: Genisys and Magic Mike XXL failing to live up to box office expectations.

Besides Terminator: Genisys not being received well by most of the critics, and Magic Mike XXL not being able to recapture the “sizzle” of Magic Mike, the Fourth of July falling on a Saturday also had an adverse effect on ticket sales for these two flicks. Audiences who might ordinarily have attended movies over the holiday weekend stayed away, to enjoy time with their families, go to beaches, and have cookouts. Even Jurassic World and Inside Out experienced steep declines in ticket sales of 25 to 35 percent on Saturday compared to Friday. For Magic Mike XXL, the drop in domestic ticket sales was a whopping 60 percent.

Opening up against Jurassic World and Inside Out would have been tough for Terminator: Genisys and Magic Mike XXL under the best of circumstances, but both flicks were still expected to earn at least in the area of $40 million each. However, as Senior media analyst for Rentrak, Paul Dergarabedian, told Variety, with Inside Out and Jurassic World continuing to perform well across all demographics, “Those two holdover films are tough to open against.”

Though the domestic box office take of Jurassic World dropped considerably, it still managed to take in enough money to take over as being the fifth highest-grossing film ever, grossing $1.385 billion worldwide and surpassing Avengers: Age of Ultron. Also, with its domestic take of $558.2 million, to date, Jurassic World has taken over from The Dark Knight to become North America’s fourth biggest movie ever.

Jurassic World and Inside Out showed enough staying power to out-perform and top both Terminator: Genisys and Magic Mike XXL at the box office over the Fourth of July weekend. The one bright ray of light for Terminator: Genisys is that it was Number One internationally, with a take of $74 million. With Minions opening up at Number Two at the international box office over the weekend with a take of $54.3 million, and set to open up domestically next weekend, that does not bode well for the future success of either Terminator: Genisys or Magic Mike XXL.

Written By Douglas Cobb

Sources:
Variety: July 4th Box Office Lacks Spark As ‘Terminator: Genisys,’
‘Magic Mike XXL’ Fail to Draw Crowds
Entertainment Weekly (blog): Box office report: Jurassic World barely
snags a win as Terminator Genisys, Magic Mike XXL fall flat
Financial Express: Box office: ‘Inside Out’ Provides Fourth of July
Fireworks Over ‘Terminator,’ ‘Magic Mike XXL’
Photo From Magic Mike XXL Courtesy Warner Brothers