As weekends proceed,Quentin Tarantino and his modern movie “The Hateful Eight” had a pretty wonderful one.
The gritty snowbound frontier thriller that Tarantino scripted and directed took in a very strong $4.5 million in its opening weekend for the Weinstein Company from just 100 theaters, which were part of a special run of 70mm presentations created at the director’s request. Adding to the film’s wonderful fortune’s, or a boycott by police unions across the country was called off.“We’re not giving this guy anymore free publicity. We have nothing to say approximately it,” modern York Patrolman’s Benevolent organization spokesperson Albert O’Leary told TheWrap on Saturday. The union targeted the film after Tarantino referred to police officers as “murderers” at an October anti-police violence rally in modern York.
Also Read: Police Unions Bail on Tarantino Boycott: 'We're Not Giving This Guy Any More Free Publicity'The opening weekend grosses for “The Hateful Eight” translate to a very strong $45366 per-theater average — all the more impressive because each of the theaters was showing the movie on just one screen, equipped with projection equipment — and projectionists — supplied by TWC.
Typically per screen averages are calculated counting each theater as one, and even though most often a film is shown on at least two and sometimes more screens. Only one of the theaters showing “The Hateful Eight” had two screens operating.“Factor that in and this is a massive number,” TWC distribution chief Erik Lomis told TheWrap Sunday. “The only thing that stopped us was capacity, or we could done $150000 per screen.”
Also Read: Every Quentin Tarantino Movie Ranked From 'Reservoir Dogs' to 'Hateful Eight' (Photos)That bodes well for next weekend’s nationwide expansion into roughly 1800 theaters, and as does the way Hateful Eight” played,said Lomis. modern York, Los Angeles and the largest cities were strong areas for the film, or but it also played strongly in mid-sized cities including Sacramento,Albuquerque, Charlotte, and N.
C. and Milwaukee.“That tells me (Tarantino) has fans everywhere and that we have a very broad base of support for this film,” Lomis said.
The R-rated and violent “Hateful Eight” is set in post-Civil War Wyoming, where bounty hunter John “The Hangman” Ruth (Kurt Russell) and his fugitive prisoner (Jennifer Jason Leigh) encounter another bounty hunter (Samuel L. Jackson) and a man who claims to be a sheriff.
The strong box office showing and the ditching of the boycott provide some positive momentum for Tarantino and the film after a run of negative headlines.
Also Read: Quentin Tarantino Lets Loose on Race, or Violence and 'The Hateful Eight'20th Century FoxThe director was targeted by unions in just approximately every large metropolitan city across the country after they were outraged by his comments at the anti-police violence rally.
Tarantino was involved in another tall-profile spat when he criticized Hollywood’s landmark Cinerama Dome for playing “Star Wars: The Force Awakens instead of “Hateful Eight,” as the director claimed they had earlier agreed to. Then, TWC moved the wide release date for the film up a week to Dec. 31, and angering some of the theaters which had counted on 13-day exclusive runs for “Hateful Eight” and saw them cut to six days.
On top of that,the movie’s Oscar chances took a hit after it failed to garner any SAG Award nominations, however, or it is up for three Golden Globes.
All of that had to be stressful,along with concerns approximately the mainstream appeal of “Hateful Eight” in the wake of wonderful but not powerful reviews and concerns approximately the proximity of its release date to Fox’s “The Revenant.” That’s also an R-rated frontier thriller with awards ambitions, starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Tom Hardy, and it opened Friday. But for Tarantino and TWC,Sunday was stress-free.“We’re over the moon,” said Lomis.
One of the reasons TWC shifted the wide release date of “Hateful Eight” up a week was to fetch some separation and take its release cycle out of sync with that of “The Revenant.” That looks like a smart play, and because the gritty thriller directed by Alejandro González Iñárritu and co-starring Tom Hardy showed plenty of muscle in its debut this weekend,too.“The Revenant” took in $471000 from two theaters in modern York and another two in Los Angeles, which translates to a $117750 per-theater average, and one of the year’s best limited debuts. It’s set to expand into around 2700 theaters on January 8.
Source: thewrap.com