It was a solid win for the box office headliner over Mother’s Day weekend as Disney and 20th Century Studios’ Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes beat expectations with a $131.2 million worldwide opening, including $58.5 million on the domestic front.
Regarding the latter figure, it’s the third best opening of 2024 so far behind only Dune: Part Two ($82.5 million) and Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire ($80 million), besting Kung Fu Panda 4 ($57.99 million) in the process.
Among the four most recent films, Kingdom‘s domestic start edged out War for the Planet of the Apes ($56.3 million) and Rise of the Planet of the Apes ($54.8 million) as the second best behind Dawn of the Planet of the Apes ($72.6 million). Not counted among those as part of the modern saga is 2001’s Planet of the Apes reboot, which bowed to $68.5 million domestically.
Globally, Kingdom also scored the third best start of the year. The $131.2 million worldwide haul exceeded 2017’s War ($130 million), marking the second best launch of the modern franchise, which began with Rise in 2011, when excluding China and factoring in modern exchange rates.
On the home front domestically, Kingdom broke out above our forecasted high-end mark of $50 million thanks to healthy reviews, reception, and PLF earnings. Disney reports that 41 percent of the weekend take came from IMAX, PLF, and other specialty formats. IMAX alone accounted for 13 percent.
Demographically, Kingdom delivered as expected with a 60 percent male audience share and 69 percent aged 25 or older. 41 percent were over the age of 35. By comparison, 2017’s War captured 57 percent male audiences and 37 percent aged 25 and older.
While Mother’s Day on Sunday could have dented grosses with the male-skewing consumer base, results actually came in stronger than projected earlier in the weekend as Kingdom only dropped 29 percent from Saturday, per Disney’s update on Monday morning.
Overall, the domestic top ten earned an estimated $90 million (pending actuals still being reported on Monday), slightly up from our forecast of $84 million last week. Approximately, that’s 31 percent over last weekend’s $68.4 million, just 6 percent down from the same weekend in 2023 ($95.2 million), and 44 percent below 2019 ($160.3 million).
Internationally, the franchise has historically played stronger with 70 percent of War‘s global take coming from outside the domestic market. 2014’s Dawn played similarly with a 71 percent international share. Should Kingdom generally follow suit, and considering the upcoming summer competition in all markets, a final domestic tally close to $150 million could be fair to expect.
Budgeted at a reported $160 million, and with eyes toward continuing the franchise, Kingdom looks to be on the path toward a profitable run with healthy chances at reaching or topping the $400 – 450 million worldwide range theatrically.