The Walt Disney Co.'s Wish had been expected to rule the Thanksgiving weekend box office, but moviegoers instead feasted on leftovers, as The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes led ticket sales for the second weekend, according to studio estimates Sunday. Neither of the weekend's top new releases—Wish and Ridley Scott's Napoleon—could keep up with Lionsgate's Hunger Games prequel. After debuting the previous weekend with $44.6 million, the return to Panem proved the top draw for holiday moviegoers, grossing $28.8 million over the weekend and $42 million over the five-day holiday frame, the AP reports. In two weeks of release, Songbirds and Snakes has grossed nearly $100 million domestically and $200 million globally.
The closer contest was for second place, with Napoleon narrowly outmaneuvering Wish. Scott's epic outperformed expectations to take $32.5 million over the five-day weekend and an estimated $20.4 million Friday through Sunday. The film, starring Joaquin Phoenix as the French emperor and Vanessa Kirby as his wife, Joséphine de Beauharnais, was also the top movie globally with $78.8 million. Reviews were mixed (61% fresh on Rotten Tomatoes) and ticket buyers were non-plussed (a B- CinemaScore), but Napoleon fared well. Napoleon, like Martin Scorsese's Killers of the Flower Moon, is a big-budget statement by Apple Studios of the streamer's swelling Hollywood ambitions. With an estimated budget of $200 million, Napoleon faces a long road to profitability for Apple, which partnered with Sony to distribute Napoleon theatrically. But it's a strong beginning for an adult-skewing, 168-minute historical drama.
Below are estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at US and Canadian theaters, according to Comscore. Final domestic figures will be released Monday.
- The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes, $28.8 million.
- Napoleon, $20.4 million.
- Wish, $19.5 million.
- Trolls Band Together, $17.5 million.
- Thanksgiving, $7.2 million.
- The Marvels, $6.4 million.
- The Holdovers, $2.8 million.
- Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour, $2.3 million.
- Five Nights at Freddy's, $1.8 million.
- Saltburn, $1.7 million.
(More
box office stories.)
,
uBlock 
,
and
Ghostery 
)
