Weekend Box Office: ‘Divergent’ separates self from pack


While she was no Bella or Katniss, Divergent’s Tris Prior managed her debut just fine. The latest young adult fantasy adaptation from Lionsgate, Divergent, opened to a commendable $54.6M over the weekend.  While that’s lower than Twilight’s $69.6M and nowhere near The Hunger Games’ record-breaking $152.5M opening in 2012, it’s still a great launch for the film and stands as the third-largest opening for an action film with a female lead.

There was a lot riding on Divergent, not just for Lionsgate but for the young adult market. Nearly all of the recent young-adult adaptations have outright bombed, from Beautiful Creatures ($7.58M), The Host ($10.6M), and The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones ($9.34M).

Lionsgate has fully committed to the property, though, giving the film a bigger budget than the first Hunger Games and getting some marquee names, including Oscar winner Kate Winslet. They are so committed to its success that they already plan to complete the trilogy, with Insurgent and Allegiant, lined up for March 2015 and 2016 releases respectively.

The marketing has been on overdrive since its trailer debut with The Hunger Games: Catching Fire in November. However, there was still some concern over just how well it would open. Both Twilight and The Hunger Games had the advantage of clearly defined conflicts: Bella and Edward’s romance is universally relatable and Katniss’s fight for survival in a post-apocalyptic America rings true not just with young adults, but with a wide range of audiences.

With Divergent, however, the stakes were never clearly defined. Trailers and sneak peeks never made clear just what, exactly, makes Shailene Woodley’s Tris Prior “different” or “special” beyond showing clips of people telling her that she’s different and that she’s at risk because of it.

Poor reviews likely won’t help convert people, with the primary complaint being that it really was trying too hard to be like Hunger Games. Its robust social media presence (it has the most Instagram followers of any film on the service) should, however, give it enough to make Lionsgate happy with its decision to move forward with the sequels.

Opening in second place was Muppets Most Wanted with $17M, which is slightly under modest expectations for the return of Kermit and company. Taking the motley crew on a European adventure akin to The Great Muppet Caper, the prominent marketing resulted in an opening that’s good for the franchise but not up to par for Disney.

The 2011 relaunch of The Muppets was executed about as well as possible, but its final gross of $88.63M had to be considered a bit disappointing considering it had the Disney marketing machine, received near-universal praise, opened on Thanksgiving weekend and had three Oscar-nominated songs.  It didn’t even have great legs, making 40% of its gross during its opening five days.

The sad truth is that one of the running jokes in The Muppets is a sad reality: many people may have simply stopped caring about the Muppets. While the 2011 film worked wonderfully as a love letter to fans and the forty-year-old characters, it seems to have done nothing to convert a younger generation that didn’t grow up with The Muppet Show or Muppet Babies. Outside of a relaunching of The Muppet Show, there may just be a limit to how well a Muppet movie can do in this day and age.

The biggest surprise this weekend was the Christian-based film God’s Not Dead, which managed $9.24M over the weekend, working out to a great $10,979 theater average, nearly twice as much as Muppets Most Wanted. The story of a student challenging an atheist philosophy professor (played by Hercules’ Kevin Sorbo) spoke directly to the devout and an appearance by Duck Dynasty’s Willie Robertson certainly helped.