Best Man Holiday opened this weekend, and I wasn’t even familiar enough with it to know that it was sequel, to 1999’s The Best Man (also, isn’t a “best man holiday” called a “bachelor party?”). Even so, the Malcolm D. Lee film (that’s Spike Lee’s cousin) starring Terrence Howard and Taye Diggs, earned an estimated $30.5 million over the weekend, almost double its $17 million budget, putting it in second place just behind Thor 2, and proving that white people not having heard of something is not an impediment to it making lots of money, just ask Kevin Hart.
Best Man Holiday earned 87% of its predecessor The Best Man‘s total gross in a single weekend, including $15,115 per venue. Imagine how much more it would’ve made if it had opened in more than 2,024 theaters. By comparison, last weekend, of the new releases, Last Vegas opened in 3,065 theaters, Free Birds in 3,736, and Ender’s Game in 3,407, all earning less than Best Man Holiday. Best Man‘s audience was 75% female and 87% black. Interesting numbers considering the majority of blockbusters are essentially aimed at white male teenagers, like my boner.
My guess is, we get a lot of movies aimed at white males because executives are mostly white males, and thus belong to the demographic that had never heard of Best Man Holiday, or Morris Chestnut and his sweet abs. But now that it’s apparent how much money there is to be made, those execs would be bad at their jobs if they didn’t take note (get those abs ready, Michael Jai White). Of course, the truth of every industry is that most people are bad at their jobs. Heck, I’m halfway into my next nap as I type this.
Elsewhere, The Hunger Games: Catching Fire opened in Brazil this weekend, earning $6.5 million there, more than twice what the first one earned ($3.2 million). It opens in the US and 65 international territories this weekend, and according to the early reviews (I don’t get to see it until tomorrow), it’s much better than the first one, as apparently director didn’t just stick the camera inside a washing machine while Lenny Kravitz’s eyeliner made oblique references to a book you didn’t read this time. That said, I will miss Futurebeard.
This weekend’s box office top 10 (domestic numbers, based on early estimates):
1 Thor: The Dark World – BV $38,454,000
2 The Best Man Holiday – Uni. $30,593,000
3 Last Vegas – CBS $8,850,000
4 Free Birds – Rela. $8,300,000
5 Jackass Presents: Bad Grandpa – Par. $7,670,000
6 Gravity – WB $6,280,000
7 Ender’s Game – LG/S $6,200,000
8 12 Years a Slave – FoxS $4,700,000
9 Captain Phillips – Sony $4,500,000
10 About Time – Uni. $3,462,000 [ThePlaylist]
From BoxOfficeMojo:
