‘Black Panther’ Headed for $63 Million in 3rd Weekend at Box Office

“Black Panther” will easily win the Oscar weekend box office again with an estimated third weekend total of $63 million. The Marvel movie added $16.3 million on its third Friday, pushing its domestic total past the $450 million mark.

“Black Panther” has now passed the $448 million domestic haul for “The Dark Knight Rises,” and today it will pass the $459 million made in North America by “Avengers: Age of Ultron” to become the third highest grossing superhero movie in domestic box office history. The record is held by “The Avengers” with $623 million, a total “Black Panther” is currently on pace to reach as it could pass the half-billion mark by the end of the weekend.

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In second place is 20th Century Fox/Chernin Entertainment’s “Red Sparrow,” which is on pace to fall short of tracker projections with a $15-17 million opening from 3,056 screens, with pre-weekend expectations set around $20-22 million. It’s a hard fall for the $69 million Jennifer Lawrence spy thriller, which performed relatively well with audiences who gave it a B on CinemaScore but got mixed reactions from critics with a 51 percent RT score.

Outside of her performances as Katniss in the “Hunger Games” series and Mystique in the “X-Men” reboot saga, Lawrence’s filmography has been more experimental than populist, working with directors like David O. Russell and Darren Aronofsky. Unless “Red Sparrow” can perform better on Saturday and push the opening weekend total towards tracker expectations, it will fail to become Lawrence’s best opening for a non-franchise film. That record is currently held by “Joy” with $17 million, followed by “Passengers” with $14.8 million.

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Also falling below tracker expectations is MGM’s “Death Wish” remake, which is currently tracking for an $11-12 million opening from 2,847 screens. Pre-weekend tracking had Eli Roth’s revenge thriller opening in the high teens. Critics panned the film with a 14 percent RT score, while audiences gave it a B+ on CinemaScore.

WB/New Line’s “Game Night” takes fourth with an estimated $9.8 million in its second weekend, keeping its drop-off to a solid 42 percent. “Peter Rabbit” is right behind in fifth with an estimated $9.5 million in its fourth weekend.

Outside the top five, Paramount’s “Annihilation,” which added 100 screens in secondary cities, is looking at a 54 percent drop off in its second weekend with an estimated $5.1 million. In seventh is “Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle,” which will pass the domestic cume of “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2” with an estimated $4 million in its 11th weekend, pushing its cume to $392 million.