The weekend of September 12 proved to be surprisingly busy at the box office, even if, on paper, it did not seem to be the case. “Demon Slayer: Infinity Castle” paved the way with an astonishing start of $ 70 million, but it was only the tip of the iceberg. Unfortunately, with a multitude of options available for potential moviegoers, a long -awaited comedy series has been left in the dust.
“Spinal Tap II: The End continues”, a series of the large model of all time in 1984 “This Is Spinal Tap”, opened at only $ 1.67 million on $ 1,920 screens at the national level this weekend. He landed in the new number on the graphics overall. This made an ugly average of $ 872 per screen. Unfortunately for Bleecker Street and the members of Spinal Tap, it is becoming a theatrical flop. He narrowly defeated the reissue of “The Sound of Music”, which pulled $ 1.6 million.
Aside from “Demon Slayer”, the other newcomers understood “Downton Abbey: The Grand Final” ($ 18.1 million) and “The Long Walk” ($ 11.5 million). Then there was “The Conjuring: Last Rites” ($ 25.6 million), which came from a record weekend for a horror film. Not to mention the reissue of “Toy Story” by Pixar ($ 3.5 million). Everything has left very little room for “Spinal Tap II” to breathe, unfortunately.
The continuation resumes 41 years after the release of the revolutionary model “This is spinal tap”, centered on group comrades now elaborated David St. Hubbins, Nigel Tufnel and Derek Smalls (Michael McKean, Christopher Guest and Harry Shearer), who are forced to meet for a last concert. Rob Reiner returned to direct the follow -up, in addition to resuming his role as a fictitious director Marty Dibergi.
Spinal Tap II fought a difficult battle at the box office
Although it may be painful that the inability of this film to draw a box at the box office is not surprising. In recent years, comedy has been a much more important draw in the Kingdom in Streaming, with films like “Nonnas” by Vince Vaughn who finds a general public on Netflix. During all this time, theatrical comedies had powerful difficulties during the pandemic era, with only Romanesque comedies such as “anyone except you” ($ 220 million worldwide) or “The Lost City” (193 million dollars worldwide) becoming reliable, most of them.
In recent years, we have seen films like “Strays” ($ 36 million worldwide), “Joy Ride” ($ 15 million worldwide), and other flops are theatrical. There are rare surprises, such as “a day” from Sony ($ 52 million worldwide) earlier this year. “The Naked Gun” has also achieved $ 101 million so far, becoming a modest blow against its budget more than $ 40 million.
In this case, however, it would always be a difficult battle. On the one hand, “This is Spinal Tap” is a beloved comedy, but it is always a nice niche film, having made less than $ 6 million around the world during its life. Even if we reserve the difficulties of comedy during the pandemic era, the follow -up of comedy expected for a long time have often had trouble. “Zoolander 2” ($ 56 million worldwide) is an excellent example. Add to that the fact that Bleecker Street does not have the resources of a big studio to market the film, not to mention the factoring in the competition this weekend, and you have more or less with a script without gain.
The good news for all those involved is that “Spinal Tap II” has a budget in the range of $ 22 million. Between whatever the box office abroad there is to collect, possible VOD / streaming income, Blu-ray sales and even a renewed interest in the original film, he will probably end up recovering his money-or, at the very least, not to lose much. It’s just a shame that it is another brick in the wall suggesting in Hollywood as a whole that the comedy made for the big screen simply does not work.
“Spinal Tap II: The end continues” is now in theaters.
