Everest hangs on at UK box-office summit

The winners: Everest and Legend

Thanks to a bunch of relatively unappealing titles landing in cinemas, Working Title-produced duo Everest and Legend had no problem holding on to the top two spots in the chart. However, the lack of competition alone cannot explain the relatively small box-office declines enjoyed by both films.

Dropping a slim 20%, Everest posted second-frame takings just shy of £2m, taking the cumulative total to £6.83m. Legend, falling 26%, is now at £13.27m. That’s enough to earn it the title of highest-grossing British 18-certificate film of all time, beating Trainspotting (£12.43m), although this comparison is not adjusted for inflation. Legend is also the 12th-biggest 18-certificate film in the UK regardless of country of origin, and next week should overtake Basic Instinct (£15.48m), Django Unchained (£15.74m) and Bruno (£15.79m).

The limp new arrivals

For the first time in 2015, no new release managed an opening tally above £500,000. Best in a weak field, with £487,000, is chick flick Miss You Already, starring Toni Collette and Drew Barrymore as two BFFs juggling marriage, motherhood, infidelity and breast cancer. In fact, you’d have to go back as far as July 2014 to unearth a weekend frame where the top new release (Tammy, with £471,000) debuted with a lower figure. That particular session coincided with the quarter finals of the football World Cup.

Landing in sixth place is thriller Solace, starring Colin Farrell and Anthony Hopkins. With a tagline promising “a serial killer who can see your future, a psychic who can save it”, Solace struggled to differentiate itself from previous thrillers involving psychics and killers. Takings of £341,000 from 332 cinemas delivered a site average of £1,026, just below Miss You Already’s £1,115.

Both those results look sparkling next to a pair films, both released in more than 100 cinemas. Captive (“Faith. Redemption. Survival”), starring Kate Mara as a single mother taken hostage by an escaped prisoner, landed in 125 cinemas, managing a weak £52,000 debut. McFarland, USA (“Champions can come from anywhere”) features Kevin Costner as a former football coach who moulds seven high-school boys into a cross-country running team. It opened with a dismal £12,800 from 115 venues.

The record breaker: Inside Out

Including takings on Monday, Inside Out has pushed past Monsters, Inc (£37.9m) to become the biggest Pixar non-sequel at the UK box office. Finding Nemo is not far behind, with £37.5m. Only Toy Story 3 (£73.8m) and Toy Story 2 (£44.3m) have taken more than Inside Out, among the Pixar canon. However, these figures excluded the 2013 3D rereleases of both Monsters, Inc and Finding Nemo. Adding in those tallies push the earlier hits to £40.4m and £38.7m respectively.

The top-grossing animated film this year remains Minions, with £46.4m. Minions looks set to fall just short of franchise best Despicable Me 2’s £47.5m.

The arthouse alternatives

Among 18 new releases, a number of titles targeted arthouse cinema-goers, with middling results. All achieving box office in the £36,000-£39,000 range are Anton Corbijn’s Life, starring Robert Pattinson and Dane DeHaan; Ramin Bahrani’s 99 Homes, with Andrew Garfield and Michael Shannon; and Nanni Moretti’s Mia Madre, with John Turturro. Life was released more widely (48 cinemas) than the other two titles, giving them a significant edge in terms of screen average. With all three films trumpeting four-star reviews, credible festival platforms and strong casts and directors, none managed to strongly punch through to audiences.

Horse race documentary Palio, released in 30 cinemas, also struggled to win arthouse audience attention, managing just under £15,000.

The niche hit: Lost in Hong Kong

Playing in just nine multiplex cinemas is Chinese comedy Lost in Hong Kong, the sequel to Lost in Thailand. Both films star and are directed and produced by Zheng Xu. Lost in Hong Kong grossed a very handy £85,000, delivering a site average of £9,477 – the highest of any film on release. It grossed $107m in China at the weekend, making it the fastest local film ever to smash the $100m barrier.

The finishing line: Secret Cinema

Secret Cinema’s presentation of The Empire Strikes Back saw takings rise by 5% for its final frame, grossing £295,000, and taking the final tally, after 100 play dates, to £6.32m. In June, after 10 days of play, we forecast the full run to manage about £6.7m, if early momentum could be maintained. The achieved result is close to that projection, thanks to fairly consistent takings throughout the run, with only a slight wobble in early September.

The previous record for Secret Cinema was last year’s Back to the Future event, grossing £3.37m. Empire Strikes Back is 88% ahead of that total. The event outgrossed a number of 2015’s big releases, including Fantastic Four (£6.18m) and Tomorrowland: A World Beyond (£5.09m) – and all from a single venue.

The Empire Strikes Back had previously grossed just over £9m in the UK.

Admissions update

Admissions figures for August, measuring number of tickets sold, show a hefty 16% drop compared with August 2014. August this year included disappointments including Fantastic Four and The Bad Education Movie, massively down on August 2014 titles such as Guardians of the Galaxy and The Inbetweeners 2.

Previously this year, cinemas had been showing strong growth compared to 2014, with admissions running 11% ahead at the end of July. Adding in the August numbers, admissions are now 7% ahead of 2014, for the first eight months of the year. The final quarter, with releases including Spectre, The Hunger Games: Mockingjay: Part 2 and Star Wars: The Force Awakens, looks promising.

The future

Takings overall are 22% down on the previous frame, and 13% down on the equivalent weekend in 2014, when Billy Elliot the Musical Live landed the top spot (the first event-cinema release ever to do so), ahead of Denzel Washington in The Equalizer. Salvation for cinema bookers may be at hand with the arrival on Thursday of Ridley Scott’s The Martian, starring Matt Damon as an astronaut stranded on the red planet. Nancy Meyers offers workplace comedy The Intern, with Robert De Niro and Anne Hathaway. Robert Zemeckis’ The Walk is playing Imax screens ahead of a full release a week later. Arthouses will be opting for Justin Kurzel’s telling of Macbeth, with Michael Fassbender and Marion Cotillard.

Top 10 films September 25-27

1. Everest, £1,996,439 from 598 sites. Total: £6,830,698

2. Legend, £1,812,808 from 563 sites. Total: £13,274,699

3. The Maze Runner: Scorch Trials, £1,150,888 from 495 sites. Total: £6,923,369

4. Miss You Already, £487,247 from 437 sites (new)

5. Inside Out, £423,331 from 520 sites. Total: £37,902,794

6. Solace, £340,537 from 332 sites (new)

7. The Visit, £310,988 from 356 sites. Total: £2,568,239

8. Secret Cinema: The Empire Strikes Back, £294,775 from one site. Total: £6,316,360

9. Pixels, £163,732 from 319 sites. Total: £8,334,036

10. Bill, £159,734 from 298 sites. Total: £446,821

Other openers

Lost in Hong Kong, £85,296 from nine sites

Kis Kisko Pyaar Karoon, £72,941 from 26 sites

Jawani Phir Nahi Ani, £69,470 from 31 sites

Captive, £52,227 from 125 sites

Arcade Fire: The Reflektor Tapes, £41,078 (including £26,071 previews) from 47 sites

Life, £38,237 (including £2,192 previews) from 48 sites

99 Homes, £38,078 from 25 sites

Mia Madre, £36,306 (including £1,152 previews) from 27 sites

Palio, £14,943 from 30 sites

McFarland, USA, £12,773 from 115 sites

Older Than Ireland, £10,264 from nine sites (Ireland only)

Just Jim, £5,470 from seven sites

Kara Bela, £3,254 from three sites

Lessons in Love, £3,117 from nine sites

Orion: The Man Who Would Be King, £2,464 from four sites

Kaun Kare Insaaf, £1,039 from 10 sites