‘Detroit’, ‘An Inconvenient Sequel’ Dominate Indie Box Office Prior to Wide Release

“Brigsby Bear” and “Menashe” were also among this weekend’s new releases

inconvenient sequel

With their wide releases coming next weekend, Annapurna’s “Detroit” and Paramount/Participant Media’s “An Inconvenient Sequel” made limited releases in New York and Los Angeles this weekend to big numbers at a very busy indie box office.

“An Inconvenient Sequel: Truth To Power,” the follow-up documentary to Al Gore’s Oscar-winning doc “An Inconvenient Truth,” grossed $130,000 from four screens this weekend to earn the highest per screen average of the weekend with $32,500. The total was buoyed by special in-person appearances by Gore himself, who hosted Q&A sessions at The Landmark Theatre in L.A. Directed by Bonni Cohen and Jon Shenk, the film premiered at this year’s Sundance and received a new cut following Donald Trump’s announcement that the U.S. would withdraw from the Paris Climate Agreement. Produced by Jeff Skoll, Richard Berge and Diane Weyermann, the film has a 76 percent rating on Rotten Tomatoes.

“Detroit” also posted strong numbers from its 20-screen release, grossing $365,455 for a PSA of $18,273. Made by the Oscar-winning director/writer duo of Kathryn Bigelow and Mark Boal (“The Hurt Locker”; “Zero Dark Thirty”), “Detroit” stars John Boyega, Anthony Mackie and Will Poulter in an unflinching account of the 1967 Detroit race riots. The film marks the launch of Annapurna’s new distribution wing, with studio founder Megan Ellison producing with Bigelow, Boal, Matthew Budman and Colin Wilson. “Detroit” received critical acclaim, earning a 94 percent “Fresh” RT rating.

Also releasing this weekend is Sony Pictures Classics’ “Brigsby Bear,” which stars Kyle Mooney as a man who spent his childhood sheltered from the outside world who discovers that his favorite show, “Brigsby Bear Adventures,” was made specifically for him by the couple who kidnapped him from the hospital at birth. Now on his own in a world he knows nothing about, he decides to give his show a proper ending. The comedy made $45,060 from three screens and has an 84 percent “Fresh” RT rating. Dave McCary directed the film from a script by Mooney and Kevin Costello.

A24 also entered a new film this weekend with “Menashe,” a film by Joshua Z. Weinstein about a widowed father in a Hasidic Jewish community in New York who tries to prove himself to his peers after he loses his son to his strict uncle due to religious traditions that forbid a single man from raising a child. Released on three screens, the film has grossed $61,409 and has a 96 percent RT rating. Weinstein wrote the script with Alex Lipschultz and Musa Syeed and premiered at Sundance this year.

Another A24 film “A Ghost Story,” will pass the $1 million mark this coming week after grossing $382,128 from 329 screens in its fourth weekend. It has a running total of $941,347. Sony Pictures Classic’s “Maudie” grossed $348,684 from 227 screens in its seventh week, putting it just $3,000 away from the $2 million mark.

Gunpowder & Sky’s “The Little Hours” stands at $1.2 million after five weekends, grossing $125,334 from 96 screens this weekend. Finally, Amazon/Lionsgate’s “The Big Sick” added $3.37 million in its sixth weekend from 1,589 screens, bringing its total to $30.4 million.

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