Disney’s ‘The Jungle Book’ delivers the third $100+ million opener of 2016, two more than 2015 had at this point in the year.
With $103.5 million opening, ‘The Jungle Book’ will be the talk of film fans for the next couple of weeks. It is an opening number that exceeds all expectations despite the pre-release buzz, Boxofficemojo.com reported.
Heading into the weekend the film had an impressive 95% rating at RottenTomatoes, a rating that was reflected in audience opinion as opening day moviegoers rewarded it with an “A” CinemaScore. The result is the second largest April opening weekend of all-time behind only last year’s ‘Furious 7’ earned $147 million.
Internationally the film expanded into a total of 49 international territories, bringing the family feature’s global tally to a whopping $290 million. Of those territories the leader is China with an estimated $50.3 million weekend, followed by India with $20.1 million, Russia ($14.2 million) and UK ($13.7 million).
The movie’s opening weekend is shy only of ‘Alice in Wonderland’ $116.1 million opening back in 2010 when compared to Disney’s recent fantasy adaptations and should be well on its way to a $300+ million domestic run.
The adventure drama is the third-highest opening weekend of 2016 after ‘Batman vs. Superman’ at $166 million and ‘Deadpool’ at $132.4 million and ahead of Disney’s ‘Zootopia’ with $75 million, Variety reported.
‘The Jungle Book’, which carries a $175 million budget, is the latest in Disney’s lucrative re-imagining of classic stories. It is based on the 19th Century English writer Rudyard Kipling stories about Mowgli, an abandoned human boy who becomes friends with jungle animals after being raised by wolves.
The original story was published in 1894. The 2016 adaptation is a little more reminiscent of the jungle and the book than the 1967 Disney animation.
Favreau’s film includes Bill Murray voicing Baloo the bear, Ben Kingsley as Bagheera the panther, Scarlett Johansson as Kaa the snake and Lupita Nyong’o as the mother wolf Raksha. Newcomer Neel Sethi stars as Mowgli.
The movie sale in India to date is the biggest opening week for any Hollywood release ever. The reason for the well reception of the film in India is probably due to the set of the story which happens in Indian jungles.
