‘The Girl on the Train’ Pulls into #1 at Weekend Box Office
The Girl on the Train has pulled into the top spot at the box office this weekend with a total of $24.7 million. The film adaptation of Paula Hawkins’ bestselling thriller starring Emily Blunt as a drunk divorcee brought in $9.4 million on Friday alone.
Directed by Tate Taylor, The Girl on the Train had a production budget of $45 million.
Falling a spot to second this weekend was Tim Burton’s Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children, which is based on the young adult novel by Ransom Riggs. The film brought in $15 million, landing it ahead of Mark Wahlberg’s Deepwater Horizon which fell to third with $11.7 million in its second week.
The Magnificent Seven remake landed in fourth, followed by the animated feature Storks in fifth. Coming in a disappointing sixth was Nate Parker’s The Birth of Nation, which earlier this year set a record-breaking deal at the Sundance Film Festival for $17.5 million. However, this weekend the film only brought in $7.1 million.
The Birth of Nation chronicles the story of former slave Nat Turner, who led a liberation movement in 1831 to free African-Americans in Virginia, resulting in a violent retaliation from white slave owners.
The movie is a passion project for Parker, who made a promise to himself in 2013 that he would not act again until he could play the American revolutionary on the big screen. With the recent controversy over the noticeable absence of black nominees at this year’s 2016 Oscars, paired with the rising racial tensions in American over the past couple of years, Parker told the crowd at Sundance that the film’s themes still resonate with audiences nearly 200 years later.
Producers had had high hopes for the critically-acclaimed film, however recent negative publicity surrounding Parker’s 17-year-old rape case, which resurfaced this past August, is believed to have affected interest in the film.
Also worth mentioning, coming in seventh this week was the Georgia-filmed Middle School: The Worst Years of My Life which made $6.9 million (on a $8.5 million production budget).
New releases coming out this Friday, October 14, 2016: The Accountant, Max Steel, and Desierto.
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