Over the Memorial Day weekend, “The Little Mermaid” inspired a desire for submersion in moviegoers.
According to studio estimates released on Sunday, Disney’s live-action adaptation of its 1989 cartoon classic easily outperformed the competition, earning $95.5 million on 4,320 screens in North America.
And Disney anticipates that by the end of the holiday season, the movie starring Halle Bailey as the titular mermaid Ariel and Melissa McCarthy as her sea witch foe Ursula would have made $117.5 million. It was the fifth-largest opening during Memorial Day weekend in history.
It replaces “Fast X” as the number one song. Vin Diesel’s “Fast and Furious” franchise’s 10th entry, which earned $23 million domestically for a two-week total of $108 million, underperformed more recent entries in the series.
Marvel’s “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3” earned an estimated $20 million in North America over its fourth weekend, placing it in third. Domestically, it has now brought in $299 million.
In fourth place, “The Super Mario Bros. Movie,” which is in its eighth weekend, is raising the bar. It is currently accessible for on-demand rental, but it still made $6.3 million in theatres. Mario and Luigi currently have the highest earnings for the year with a combined gross of $559 million.
Ariel was too strong for comics, and the week’s other new releases failed.
With $4.9 million, the action comedy “The Machine,” starring Mark Hamill and Bert Kreischer, came in fifth place. The broad comedy “About My Father,” starring Robert De Niro and stand-up Sebastian Maniscalco, came in sixth place with $4.3 million.
On Tuesday, final results are anticipated.
