Together with Birds of Prey ($33.25 million domestic and $81 million worldwide) stumbling out of the gate, the holdovers had mostly decent legs over Oscar weekend. Leading the bunch of non-openers has been Bad Boys For Life. The $90 million Will Smith/Martin Lawrence action comedy earned an additional $12 million (-32percent ) at the weekend. That gives Sony and Columbia’s third Bad Boys picture a 166.327 million domestic cume. The movie has earned over $336 million. At this speed, it is going to flirt with becoming the first”new” January launch (American Sniper has been an Oscar platformer) to high $200 million domestic and become one of the biggest R-rated actioners ever.
The random reality, once it earns $191 million, it’ll be behind just Rush Hour 2 ($226 million in 2001) and Guys in Black ($250 million in 1997) one of all”buddy cop action comedy” offerings in unadjusted national earnings. When it gets beyond $193 million, it will have handed the unadjusted domestic earnings of The Hand That Rocks the Cradle ($88 million in January of 1992) and Bad Boys II ($138 million in July of 2003) to have sold more tickets than Bad Boys II and function as the second (unless I missed you ) biggest”tickets offered” January release behind M.A.S.H. ($81 million back in 1970).
Once it enters $176 million following weekend, it’ll have out-grossed Air Force One ($171 million in 1997), The Matrix ($171 million), and John Wick: Chapter 3 ($173 million). That will make that, again sans inflation, one of the biggest R-rated actioners ever behind Terminator 2: Judgment Day ($204 million in 1991), Logan ($229 million), The Matrix Reloaded ($279 million in 2003), Deadpool 2 ($324 million in 2018), American Sniper ($350 million in 2014/2015) and Deadpool ($363 million in 2016). It is still holding in addition to each similar title save for Mission: Impossible – Fallout ($181 million in 24 days), however that sixth M: I movie fell 44 percent in weekend four.
Together with Birds of Prey now on the defensive, Bad Boys 3 is still the event picture of the moment. It’s now utterly plausible that Bad Boys For Life could end up earning more from North America compared to No Time to Die (Spectre earned $200 million, becoming just the second 007 film to do so after the $304 million-grossing Skyfall) and F9 (Fate of the Furious earned $226 million in ancient 2017). I anticipate Black Widow to pull Doctor Unusual -to-Winter Soldier ($232-$259 million) domestic earnings. Still, it might draw closer to Ant-Man along with the Wasp ($216 million), which will allow it to be a closer competition.
In any event, Bad Boys For Life is a hugely overperforming motion picture, showing again that Will Smith is a bankable movie star when he is in a franchise and that there’s an audience for R-rated, grounded, character-and-star-driven action movies that aren’t fantastical and don’t involve wizards, pirates, superheroes or robots in disguise. With Jumanji: The Next Level around to top $300 million nationally ($298.46 million), Small Girls passing $100 million last week, A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood earning $61 million with barely any Oscar focus, Sony is in a fantastic place right now no matter how Fantasy Island performs following weekend.
