‘Beauty and the Beast’ waltzes away with another No. 1 Lindsey Bahr
Not all reboots are created equal.
This weekend at the box office, nostalgia-driven fare was everywhere, producing both successful and underwhelming results.
On the high end, Disney’s liveaction Beauty and the Beast continued enchanting audiences in its second weekend, easily topping the charts with $88.3 million, according to studio estimates. On the low end, the raunchy, R-rated
CHIPS made its debut in seventh place with $7.6 million. In the middle was Power Rang
ers, which earned a solid $40.5 million to grab the No. 2 spot. The PG-13 take on the campy ’90s TV show tells the ori- gin story of the Power Rangers with a diverse cast.
Power Rangers didn’t get the best reviews, but audiences gave it a promising A grade on CinemaScore, suggesting that it might have staying power.
CHIPS, on the other hand, underwhelmed both audiences and critics. Dax Shepard wrote, directed and starred in the comedy based on the 1970s show about the California Highway Patrol.
Costing $25 million to produce, CHIPS wasn’t the biggest risk, but its $7.6 million debut disappointed. The film also got a deathly B-minus from audiences on CinemaScore.
“Brand recognition will get you far — it gives you a leg up before you even start — but at the end of the day, it comes down to the movie itself,” says Paul Dergarabedian, of comScore.
The sci-fi thriller Life also failed to connect with audiences, debuting in fourth place with $12.6 million behind holdover
Kong: Skull Island, which finished third with $14.4 million.
The R-rated film stars Jake Gyllenhaal and Ryan Reynolds as astronauts who discover the alien life form they’ve brought on board might be dangerous.
Dergarabedian says part of its muted launch might be that because the much-anticipated Alien: Covenant and Guardians of the
Galaxy Vol. 2 are on the horizon. Despite some flops, the March 2017 box office, which crossed $1 billion this weekend, has become the biggest March of all time, thanks to Logan, Skull Is
land, Get Out and Beauty and the Beast. Final figures are expected Monday.