Updated on December 10, 2021
As expected, the well-received and well-reviewed animated film “The Lego Movie” was the top film this weekend at the box office, earning $69.1 million. (The film only cost $60 million to produce.) With strong word of mouth, it’s expected to likely do well over the next several weeks, especially next weekend being President’s Day.
“The Lego Movie” has also broken a few box office records, according to Forbes: it’s the second-largest opening in February of all time after “The Passion of the Christ,” or third-largest after adjusting for inflation. It’s also the biggest opening ever for a Warner Bros. animated film. Thus, you can expect “The Lego Movie 2” in theaters at some future point. Forbes and others are already throwing around the word “franchise.”
That said, other animated films still did OK in spite of the competition. “Frozen” came in in fourth place with $6.9 million, for a total to date of $368.7 million. “The Nut Job” is also lingering on in eighth place, earning $3.8 million for a total to date of $55 million. I assume “The Nut Job” will drop out of the top 10 shortly, if not next weekend.
On the live-action side, “Ride Along” crossed the $100 million mark in second place, earning $105 million to date. However, I expect it to drop next weekend with the release of the “Robocop” remake. Despite having “The Lego Movie” as competition, “Robocop” should do well, especially since it’s PG-13, versus the original’s R rating.
Overseas, “Mr. Peabody and Sherman” (“The Lego Movie”‘s next major new animated competition) opened in the United Kingdom, where it easily trounced “Robocop”‘s opening there (earning $6.6 million to “Robocop”‘s $3.7 million). It’ll open here in North America March 7.
