Sony’s long-awaited and nostalgia-fueled supernatural comedy sequel “Ghostbusters: Afterlife” is on track to earn $28-35 million in its domestic box office debut this coming weekend.
Sony is estimating the lower whilst others are suggesting the higher of those numbers for the PG-13 effort which will likely take first place with little competition. The film cost around $75 million to produce.
The only other major film opening is the Will Smith-led sports drama “King Richard” about the father of tennis superstars Venus and Serena Williams. That film is tracking for an $8-10 million opening along with its simultaneous HBO Max launch.
The Reitman-directed “Ghostbusters: Afterlife” is currently scoring slightly worse on Rotten Tomatoes than the 2016 Paul Feig-directed reboot (67% vs. 72%) with critics. Most of the criticism is targeted at the film’s heavy use of callbacks and reliance on nostalgia along with some complaints about its ‘lack of fun’. Plenty though are quite positive and call it a feel-good film.
“King Richard” has been granted very strong word-of-mouth and sits at an impressive 92% on the review site. There are already predictions the film could well end up in the awards race.
Source: THR
