Box Office USA: Furiosa and Garfield Lead the Worst Memorial Day Weekend in Decades

Americans are enjoying a long weekend due to Memorial Day on Monday. Unfortunately, it would be hard to tell from the box office results. The two biggest releases of the week collectively earned only half of what “The Little Mermaid” made on its own last year. Overall, this weekend’s box office revenues are the lowest in 25 years.

However, this does not mean that the past weekend lacked excitement for box office enthusiasts. At the moment, it’s impossible to predict who the real leader is.

Current estimates give a slight edge to Warner Bros.’ “Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga.” But this is solely due to nearly double the earnings from Thursday’s previews. With each passing day, “Garfield” is closing the gap and might take the lead by Monday for the four-day opening.

Warner Bros. estimates that “Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga” will earn $25.6 million by the end of Sunday. Considering the budget is estimated at $169 million, this is a financial flop. Currently, George Miller’s spectacle is vying for the tenth spot on the list of this year’s openings, matching “Civil War” ($25.5 million).

“Furiosa” is unlikely to come close to the performance of “Mad Max: Fury Road.” That film debuted nine years ago in May with $45.4 million.

The estimated earnings for the “Garfield” animation by the end of Sunday are almost identical. Sony estimates them at $24.8 million. In this case, however, it’s considered a solid start due to the film’s budget being only $60 million.

Moreover, out of the three theatrical releases featuring Garfield, the latest one boasts the best opening in America. “Garfield” from 2004 earned $21.7 million on its debut, while “Garfield 2” from 2006 had an opening of only $7.3 million.

The third major release was “Sight,” a new film from Angel Studios, a production company specializing in content for a conservative Christian audience. However, this historical drama inspired by true events did not attract large crowds, earning only $2.7 million.

There is another new entry in the top ten. It’s the comedy “Babes,” which was shown in only 12 theaters last week. Now, the distributor has increased the number of locations to 590, which was enough for the film to earn one million dollars and climb into the top ten.

Four major releases are planned for the upcoming Friday: the comedy-drama “My Son Ezra,” the extremely brutal horror “In a Violent Nature” (the distributor refused to submit it for MPAA rating because it risked an NC-17 rating and decided to release it as “unrated”), another comedy featuring Diane Keaton “Summer Camp,” and the second highest-grossing Japanese film of the year “Haikyu!! The Dumpster Battle.”