Weekend projections: Sinners heads into the stratosphere with $45-million second weekend

Sinners will decline just 6% from its opening weekend to earn $45 million, according to Warner Bros. Sunday-morning projection. Taking out the film’s $4.7 million in previews, it’s actually up from last weekend, with Saturday’s estimated gross, $18.8 million, 14% higher than last Saturday. That’s an off-the-charts crazy performance. And there’s more…

Sinners is headed to the third-best second-weekend ever for a movie that opened over $40 million (click the image for the full top 100):

What’s even more remarkable about that performance is that the two films above it, Shrek and Avatar opened the weekends for Memorial Day and Christmas respectively. The closest any major film has come to having this hold outside of holidays periods is Twister’s 10% decline way back in 1996.

Our model is now predicting Sinners will finish with $208 million at the domestic box office, with a high-side potential of $280 million. It’s already a virtual certainty for the top-grossing film of the year not based on previous IP, and will clearly have a long and very healthy run in theaters (if Warner Bros. lets it—and they’d be fools not to). The studio notes this morning that the audience has broadened since opening weekend, with now a 50–50 male/female split, compared to a 56% male audience on opening weekend. Ethnic demographics have also expanded, with this weekend’s audience 39% Caucasian, 35% African-American, and 18% Hispanic. The South “continues to over-index,” per the studio, but they’re “seeing strength across the entire U.S.”

Here are the official studio projections for the three-day weekend (click the image for a full chart of all films reporting so far):

The good news doesn’t end with Sinners. Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith is having a great weekend for a re-release (one of the best ever in that category, in fact). The Accountant 2 is probably being harmed a little by the performance of Sinners, but is still posting an excellent debut. Minecraft continues to be a juggernaut. Even The Legend of Ochi is out-performing the model’s Friday-morning prediction, although it is a disappointment overall.

– Studio weekend projections

– All-time top-grossing movies in North America

– All-time top-grossing movies worldwide

Please help support The Numbers with a monthly or one-time donation, or by subscribing to The Numbers Business Report. We keep advertising to a minimum, and only for advertisers who we believe are directly of interest to our readers. If you’d like to advertise your movie or service with us, please email us at advertising(at)the-numbers.com.

Bruce Nash, bruce.nash@the-numbers.com