UPDATE 1-Box Office: 'Straight Outta Compton' Schools 'Sinister 2,' 'Hitman: Agent 47' With $26.8 Million

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By Brent Lang
LOS ANGELES, Aug. 23 (Variety.com) - "Straight Outta
Compton" dominated a trio of underwhelming new releases this
weekend, providing a little proof of life in an otherwise
moribund box office.
The rap drama topped charts for the second weekend in a row,
picking up $26.8 million from 3,025 locations and propelling its
domestic haul to $111.5 million. That's a tidy return on the $29
million that Universal and Legendary spent making the film about
the early days of N.W.A. "Straight Outta Compton" that hasn't
been without controversy. The film has been slammed for glossing
over its members treatment of women and the blowback forced Dr.
Dre to apologize for his actions. Negative headlines do not
appear to be taking a toll on its ticket sales.
Of the new films hitting multiplexes, "Sinister 2" performed
the best of an inert bunch. The low-budget horror sequel nabbed
$10.6 million from 2,766 locations for a third place finish.
That's less than the $14 million to $16 million that Focus
Features, the studio behind the film, had been expecting to pull
in, and it also trails the first "Sinister's" $18 million
opening. The good news is that "Sinister 2" cost less than $10
million to make, limiting the studio's financial exposure.
Fox's "Hitman: Agent 47," a second attempt to transform a
popular video game series into a successful film one, hit a
speed bump, earning a meagre $8.2 million across 3,261
locations. It had been expected to generate $11 million in
receipts. Swapping "Justified's" Timothy Olyphant for
"Homeland's" Rupert Friend as the titular assassin didn't
provide much sizzle, as the latest "Hitman" failed to match the
$13.1 million opening of its 2007 predecessor. "Hitman: Agent
47" cost $35 to bring to the screen.
That left Lionsgate's "American Ultra" as the lowest
performing of the newbies. The marijuana-encrusted secret agent
film went up in smoke, grabbing $5.5 million from 2,778
locations, and securing sixth place. The film centers on a
stoner (Jesse Eisenberg) who discovers he is really a slightly
crisped version of Jason Bourne. It reunites Eisenberg with
Kristen Stewart, his co-star from 2009's "Adventureland."
All three films carried R-ratings and catered to adult
crowds, something that may have depressed their results.
"At the end of the day, they cannibalized each other," said
Chris Aronson, Fox's distribution chief. "It's an unfortunate
confluence of events. All three of those films combined would
have made a decent opening for any one of them."
Among holdovers, Paramount's "Mission: Impossible - Rogue
Nation" had a second place finish with $11.7 million. The fifth
film in the spy series has earned $157.8 million stateside.
"The Man From U.N.C.L.E.," an attempt to revive a television
show few remembered, earned $7.4 million in its second weekend,
edging out "American Ultra" for fifth place. The action film has
earned $26.6 million domestically thus far, signaling it will
have trouble recouping its $75 million production budget barring
a surge in pop culture nostalgia among foreign crowds.
In the art house world, Sony Pictures Classics scored a
solid debut for "Grandma." The comedy about a grandmother
helping her granddaughter find the money to pay for an abortion,
has earned rave reviews for its star Lily Tomlin, and picked up
$120,856 on four screens, for per screen average of $30,214.
The Orchard fielded Joe Swanberg's off-beat mystery "Digging
for Fire" on-demand and on three screens where it earned an
estimated $24,544.
Broad Green, the newly created distribution company from
brothers Gabriel Hammond and Daniel Hammond, launched its first
in-house production with "Learning to Drive." The comedy is
pitched at older crowds and stars Sir Ben Kingsley and Patricia
Clarkson. It grossed $67,417 from four locations for a
per-screen average of $16,854.
The company was particularly pleased that the film picked up
steam as the weekend rolled on, indicating that word-of-mouth is
strong. It will expand to four additional markets next weekend.
"We always saw the first three weeks as basically a series
of previews," said Travis Reid, Broad Green's president of
distribution. "We knew the movie needed to get established,
because it's a film that audiences really, really respond to."
And "Trainwreck" checked an important milestone off its
list, as its $2.5 million weekend gross pushed the comedy past
the $100 million mark after six weeks in theaters.
Overall ticket sales were down roughly 7 percent from the
year-ago period when "Guardians of the Galaxy" and "Teenage
Mutant Ninja Turtles" were still drawing healthy crowds.