Disney and Pixar’s “Cars 3” dominated North American box office with an estimated 53.5 million US dollars during its debut weekend, racing past “Wonder Woman” to the first place.
“Cars 3” is now on track for a $60 million debut despite opening against four other films this Father’s Day weekend.
A budget for “Cars 3” wasn’t disclosed.
Direct predecessor “Cars 2” debuted with $66.1 million in 2011.
In “Cars 3“, Owen Wilson returns as the voice of Lightning McQueen.
Yet “Wonder Woman” continues to show strength in its third weekend of release, bringing in an additional $40-plus million to capture the #2 spot at the domestic box office. This marks a 30 percent drop for the DC film, whose domestic and global totals now stand at approximately $274.6 million and $571.8 million, respectively.
Rounding out the top five was the $11.5 million debut from 2,270 theaters for the shark thriller 47 Meters Down. The original Cars earned $19.7 million on opening day, and the first sequel improved on that by taking in $25.7 million.
While few outside of Disney’s merchandising department were asking for it, Cars 3 still manage to find its opening weekend audience. Only one in four critics had praise for the movie, in which Demetrius Shipp Jr. plays rapper Shakur.
The flick falls behind “The Mummy” ($13.9 million) and “Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales” ($8.5 million), both in its second weekend. Lionsgate’s biopic about hip-hop star Tupac Shakur placed third, earning an estimated $27.1 million at the domestic box office. Overseas, the film has banked a far better $239 million so far. That puts the film on pace to beat the $325.1 million domestic total made by “Suicide Squad” previous year.
Sony Pictures’ R-rated comedy “Rough Night“, featuring Scarlett Johansson and Kate McKinnon, was a miss with a take of $8.1 million, or only about half of the $16 million projection of BoxOfficePro.com.
With that said, Focus’ “The Book of Henry” starring Naomi Watts and Jacob Tremblay is only expected to take in $1.5 million from 579 theaters this weekend.
Per ComScore, overall box office is up 2.7 percent in the same frame from a year ago. Whether that is a result of bad word-of-mouth or not is something that next weekend will determine.