‘Megalopolis’ flops, ‘The Wild Robot’ soars at box office

Francis Ford Coppola’s decades-in-the-making, self-financed epic “Megalopolis” flopped with moviegoers, while the acclaimed DreamWorks Animation family film “The Wild Robot” soared to No. 1 at the weekend box office.

“The Wild Robot,” Chris Sanders’ adaptation of Peter Brown’s bestseller, outperformed expectations to launch with US$35 million in ticket sales in U.S. and Canada theatres, according to studio estimates Sunday. “Wild Robot” was poised to do well after critics raved about the story of a shipwrecked robot who raises an orphan gosling. Audiences agreed, giving the film an A CinemaScore. “Wild Robot” is likely set up a long and lucrative run for the Universal Pictures release.

Paul Dergarabedian, senior media analyst for Comscore, predicts “The Wild Robot” “may take a page from the ‘Elemental’ playbook by opening to respectable box office and then looking toward long-term playability.” Pixar’s “Elemental,” which like “The Wild Robot” wasn’t a sequel, debuted with a modest US$30 million but went on to gross nearly US$500 million worldwide.

Family movies, led by the year’s biggest hit in “Inside Out 2,” have particularly powered the box office this year. David A. Gross, a film consultant who publishes a newsletter for Franchise Entertainment, said the genre should reach US$6 billion worldwide in 2024 — which, he noted, “is back to pre-pandemic levels.”

“Megalopolis,” Coppola’s vision of a Roman epic set in modern-day New York, was never expected to perform close to that level. But the film’s US$4 million debut was still sobering for a movie that Coppola bankrolled himself for US$120 million. Following its premiere at the Cannes Film Festival, critics have been mixed on Coppola’s first film in 13 years. Audiences gave in a D+ CinemaScore.

By any financial measure, “Megalopolis” was a mega-flop. But from the start, the 85-year-old Coppola maintained money wasn’t his concern. Coppola fashioned the film, which he first began developing in the late 1970s, as a grand personal statement about human possibility.

“Everyone’s so worried about money,” Coppola told The Associated Press in an interview ahead of the film’s release. “I say: Give me less money and give me more friends.”

Studios passed on “Megalopolis” after Cannes. Lionsgate ultimately stepped forward to distribute it, for a fee. Coppola also picked up the tab for most of its US$15 million in marketing costs. The film, which stars Adam Driver, Nathalie Emmanuel and Aubrey Plaza, also played in about 200 IMAX locations, which accounted for US$1.8 million of its ticket sales.

After three weeks atop the box office, Tim Burton’s “Beetlejuice Beetlejuice” slid to second place with US$16 million in its fourth weekend of release. The Warner Bros. sequel to the 1988 “Beetlejuice,” starring Michael Keaton and Winona Ryder, has amassed US$250 million domestically in a month of release.

Third place went to “Transformers One,” the Transformers prequel starring Chris Hemsworth and Brian Tyree Henry. After its lower-than expected debut last weekend, the Paramount release collected US$9.3 million on its second weekend.

“Megalopolis” was even bested by the Indian Telugu-language action film “Devara: Part 1.” It grossed US$5.1 million in its opening weekend, good enough for fourth place.

Also debuting in theatres was Jason Reitman’s “Saturday Night,” an affectionate dramatization of the sketch-comedy institution on the night it first aired in 1975. On the same weekend the NBC series began its 50th season, Reitman’s movie launched in five New York and Los Angeles theatres and collected US$265,000, good for a strong US$53,000 per-theatre average. “Saturday Night” goes nationwide in two weeks.