Box Office Predictions: The Little Mermaid set for over $100 Million debut

This weekend sees the latest release in Disney’s “let’s just remake all of our old films but with real people and make a billion dollars each time” line of films with the live action update to 1989’s Oscar winning The Little Mermaid. And if the tracking for this one is any indication, Disney will have another billion dollar grosser on its hands as The Little Mermaid is expected to open anywhere between $100-$120 million, with a range like that I always like to split the difference and call it at $110 million for the 3-day take while the 4-day Memorial Day haul will be closer to that $120 million. That opening will put it less than both The Lion King and Beauty and the Beast live action openings ($191.7 and $174.7 million respectively, although was The Lion King remake really live action?!) but above the $91.5 million opening of 2019’s Aladdin which went on to do $1.054 billion worldwide.

When the film was first announced it was met with some criticism for its casting choice, which never made sense to me, all that mattered to me was that whoever they chose for Ariel could belt out the classic tunes the way I remember them from my childhood. When that first trailer was released, all worries were cast aside as Halle Bailey’s amazing voice belted out “Part of Your World” surrounded by what looked like really solid underwater visual effects, I knew at the very least we would be getting something that looked and sounded great. Early reviews seem to be on the positive side saying that Bailey’s performance is tremendous and the visuals are striking while some feel the film just can’t live up to the original classic with our own Chris Bumbray calling the remake “unnecessary” in his 6/10 review. 

Last week saw part one of the two (or three or four or five or twenty) part finale to the The Fast and the Furious franchise with Fast X (pronounced Fast Ten, like Fast-Ten your seat belts, according to the director) slightly underperform in its domestic debut with just $67 million (a far cry from the series high $147.1 million made by 2015’s Furious 7, although just $3 million shy of 2021’s F9: The Fast Saga’s $70 million debut which still legged out to a $726.2 million worldwide total.) The good news is that international audiences are still here for these films as Fast X has already taken in over $348 million world wide, Of course if the $340 million budget is to be believed, this movie needs to hit the Billion dollar club and then some to be considered profitable. The memorial day weekend may help get some butts in seats, but with almost all premium screens going to The Little Mermaid, this one may sink pretty hard at the domestic box office and lose over 60% of its audience with roughly $26 million.

Spots three and four will go to the Chris Pratt one two punch of Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 with an additional $20 million and The Super Mario Bros. Movie with another $7 million, although those numbers may grow if families get to the theaters and see that all the good seats are taken for The Little Mermaid and decide to take in one of those instead. 

There actually are other new releases this weekend that aren’t expected to really light the box office on fire, but worth mentioning as they don’t look too bad. First up is the Sebastian Maniscalco/ Robert DeNiro team up About My Father that looks to be in the vein of DeNiro’s other family related comedy Meet The Parents only this time DeNiro gets to play it a bit more loose. Reviews are pretty low for this PG13 rated comedy (including a 6/10 from our own Alex Maidy) but the star power of Robert DeNiro should get enough people in the theater for a light hearted comedy that it could crack the top five this weekend with no more than $6 million. If that comedian teamed up with a legendary actor film isn’t your cup of tea, you have another to choose from as comedian Bert Kreischer teams up with the legendary Mark Hamill for The Machine which is based on a true story Kreischer tells in his stand up act about the time he interacted with Russian mobsters. With no reviews yet, and a real lack of online chatter, this one isn’t expected to make a big dent at the box office, however Kreischer loyalists will hopefully propel it to the $4 million mark.

Last but not least is the Gerard Butler starring Kandahar, which I have only ever seen one trailer for, said “oh, that looks decent” and kind of forgot about! If I forgot about it, I bet general audiences have as well and that will translate to a lackluster $3 million opening. 

What are your weekend plans? Do they include heading to the theater to check out one of these movies? Let us know in the comments section and don’t forget to check back on Saturday when we have brief update on where the box office numbers are heading.

TOP FIVE PREDICTIONS:

1. The Little Mermaid– $110 Million
2. Fast X– $26 Million
3. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3– $20 Million
4. The Super Mario Bros. Movie– $7 Million
5. About My Father– $6 million