SUNDAY UPDATE, Refresh for latest: Warner Bros/Legendary Entertainment’s Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire has roared to a $194M global opening, of which $114M is from 63 international box office markets. The monster mash exceeded expectations, with over-performance in several offshore markets as well as domestic.
In like-for-like overseas markets at today’s exchange rates, the film is tracking 30% ahead of Godzilla, 25% higher than Dune: Part Two, 17% over Transformers: Rise of the Beasts, 16% above Meg 2: The Trench, 6% over Godzilla Vs Kong and on par with Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One.
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PREVIOUS, SATURDAY: Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire continues to show gusto at the international box office, coming in with an added $31.2M on Friday for a three-day running cume of $47.9M in 62 markets. Not included in that total is the China Saturday which added an estimated $18M – that’s a good sign in the Hollywood-tepid market and portends a $40M+ opening session there. Domestic is also psyched on the sequel – and if the numbers hold through Easter Sunday GxK will top $175M.
As noted yesterday (see below), China opened on Friday to $13.4M for the beasts. They dominated the market with an 80% share on 35,698 screens. This puts the opening day there on par with Jurassic World Dominion, 51% ahead of Godzilla, and more than double the opening days of Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 and Warner Bros/Legendary’s own Dune: Part Two. This is a great start in the current China climate and bodes for a $100M+ final — basically a bonus these days in China.
Elsewhere, and through true Friday play, the UK opened to $2.4M on 1,080 screens and ranked No. 1 ahead of fellow opener Kung Fu Panda 4. Premium formats are performing very strongly with IMAX at 11% of the total box office, both 3D and 4DX at 5% apiece and Screen X capturing 2%. These results are the biggest opening day for a Monsterverse film as well as higher than several comps.
India on Friday had a notable opening taking in $1.9M on 2,882 screens and ranking No. 1 ahead of the opening of three local titles. This marked the biggest opening day for a WB Film, the best of 2024 for a U.S. title and tops for the Monsterverse. IMAX represented 9% of the total box office from 29 screens.
The top markets through Friday outside China are Mexico ($7.2M), UK ($2.4M), Spain ($2.2M), Australia ($1.9M) and India ($1.9M)
Updates to come…
PREVIOUS, FRIDAY: Warner Bros/Legendary Entertainment’s Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire is out and roaring at the international box office, generating $15.9M from 49 markets through its first two days overseas (Wed/Thurs). Not included in that total is the strong China opening day today which came in at an estimated RMB 96.9M ($13.4M).
Among highlights through Thursday, Latin America gave the beasts the biggest opening day of the year and the best ever for the Monsterverse. In Cambodia, the Adam Wingard-directed pic scored the best opening day of all time for a Warner Bros movie.
The top overall market on Thursday was Mexico with $4.1M including previews and a 69% share of the Top 5 films. That’s the best start of the year and is above all comps.
Australia debuted to $782K on Thursday, ranking No. 1 with a 50% share of the Top 10 titles. The result is above Godzilla Vs Kong (+11%), Mission: Impossible 7 (+45%), Transformers: Rise of the Beasts (+115%), Godzilla: King of the Monsters (+170%), Meg 2 (+188%) and Kong: Skull Island (+523%).
Spain, which bowed on Wednesday, held the No. 1 landing, now with $1.4M through two days.
Overall, the Top 5 markets to date (and excluding the China Friday as noted above) are Mexico ($4.1M), Spain ($1.4M), Indonesia ($881K), Taiwan ($819K) and Malaysia ($797K).
As regards China (where Legendary East distributes its modern monster series), the film has a 9.4 from audiences on Maoyan which is currently forecasting an RMB 781.3M ($108.2M) total run. It’s early days and these projections do tend to fluctuate, but the Friday start bodes well given that Hollywood films have been doing far less business in the market of late and means that GxK could get to a very solid $40M opening frame.
We’ll have more updates through the weekend.
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Nancy Tartaglione
