This Friday will be a busy one at theaters, with a number of potential blockbusters opening, including Neighbors 2: Sorority Rising and The Nice Guys. However, the weekend will likely belong to Sony’s The Angry Birds Movie, which has been riding a steady stream of hype since its announcement in 2013.
Rovio has put over $113 million into the film production, and it definitely looks like it’s paying off, as noted in a new blog post that the film has already a big success prior to its United States release this week.
The film has made $43 million thus far, shooting to the number one position in 37 different markets, creating a record May opening for an original animated film. It’s also getting some strong word-of-mouth and critical praise.
The biggest market for The Angry Birds Movie so far is Russia, where it cleaned up with a record $5.7 million. Close behind were the U.K. ($3 million), Germany ($2.9 million) and Mexico ($2.9 million).
Making a successful video game film can be risky these days, especially with the failures of many projects, like Ratchet & Clank, which is on its way out of theaters with less than $10 million accumulated. However, in a recent [a]listdaily interview, Wilhelm Taht, executive vice president of games for Rovio, noted, “In general, video games have been a challenging thing to take to the big screen for a wide variety of reasons. One of the biggest challenges is the narrative has not always been fantastic in video games, and it’s challenging to translate that into an interesting story that runs for 90 minutes. Also, it’s often times a very hardcore story. Big video game brands are often weapon-aggressive and have a hardcore background that can be challenging to bring to big screen.”
It appears that Angry Birds has no trouble appealing to an audience, especially with a voice cast that features actors like Jason Sudeikis, Josh Gad and Game of Thrones‘ Peter Dinklage.
It’s too soon to tell how box office estimates look for The Angry Birds Movie‘s debut in the U.S., but it should find a number one spot fairly easily, with Marvel’s Captain America: Civil War being its biggest opposition. But that film will be in its third week at theaters, so it should give the Birds just enough room to do some damage.
The Angry Birds Movie opens this Friday.
