Box Office: 'Sinners' Drops Just 5% For Bigger Second-Weekend Gross Than Both 'Inception' and 'Gravity'
Ryan Coogler's buzzy blockbuster had one of the best second-weekend holds for a wide release that didn't open just prior to Thanksgiving or amid the year-end holidays.
Sinners topped the domestic box office again, which isn’t the big story. As always, rank is mere trivia, and it’s the raw gross that matters. And in this case, Ryan Coogler and Michael B. Jordan’s R-rated original earned another $45.7 million, declining just 4.7% from its $48 million opening weekend. Yes, the estimates were slightly lower than the actual Friday-to-Sunday grosses. Sinners still has the third smallest “drop” for any $45 million-plus opener ever behind (unless I missed one) The Grinch and Avatar, both of which had (respectively) Thanksgiving and Christmas to buffer those post-debut holds.
However, as you know, the vast majority of tiny drops or slight upticks for weekend two are either amid Thanksgiving weekend or during the year—end Christmas/New Year’s blitz. Take away that “advantage,” and WBD’s $90 million horror flick will rank ninth in second-weekend drops for wide-release flicks (opening on 2,000 screens or more) that didn’t open just before Thanksgiving around Christmas. And even most of the eight “smaller” drops have an asterisk or two.