Super Mario Bros. and Return Of The Jedi give the weekend box office a chill ‘80s vibe
Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret. manages to defeat an old Star Wars
Aux News Super Mario Bros.
It’s been a totally tubular weekend at the U.S. box office, with a lot of neon colors and boomboxes and disastrous public policies enacted by the Reagan administration. That’s right: It’s the ‘80s again. Specifically 1983, when Star Wars: Episode VI—Return Of The Jedi and an arcade game called Mario Bros. (the predecessor to the NES’ Super Mario Bros.) were all the rage, plus cool kids everywhere were playing Dungeons & Dragons in their basements and Nike was signing Michael Jordan to a licensing deal that would effectively change the future of professional sports (though that happened slightly later). Also there’s an Evil Dead movie! Radical!
Yes, Return Of The Jedi jumped into the top five this week, some 2,000 weeks after it premiered, making a solid $4.6 million from fewer than 500 screens. Number one went to The Super Mario Bros. Movie, naturally, which made another $40 million this weekend and is just a hair short of $500 million domestic. Second place went to Evil Dead Rise again, making $12 million (it has $44 million after two weeks), and then newcomer Are There God? It’s Me, Margaret., a movie title that sure has a lot of punctuation in it. The adaptation of the iconic Judy Blume book (which, sadly, came out in the ‘70s) made $6.8 million.
Elsewhere on the charts, there were limited rollouts for Ponniyin Selvan: Part Two and Nazi-stabbing movie Sisu, but the wider release for—deep breath—Big George Foreman: The Miraculous Story Of The Once And Future Heavyweight Champion Of The World failed to crack the top 10 by a few hundred thousand.
The full top 10 from Box Office Mojo, written out with no gnarly ‘80s references, is below.
- The Super Mario Bros. Movie
- Evil Dead Rise
- Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret.
- John Wick: Chapter 4
- Star Wars: Episode VI—Return Of The Jedi
- Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves
- Air
- Ponniyin Selvan: Part Two
- The Covenant
- Sisu
18 Comments
The first Star War I ever saw. Still my favorite too.
One of my very first memories was finding my dad sitting on a couch and watching a movie, and it was the Jabba’s Palace scene. I remember just being in awe at all those different creatures.
The first one I haven’t seen. Saw the first two in 1997 and that was enough star wars for me.I dunno, I guess you have to see this movies for the first time when you’re a kid rather than in your twenties. I can’t get into it.
I liked it until the escape from Jabba got too slapsticky. Then i liked it again until the ewoks took down the imperials. then i liked the ending.still better than pretty much everything star wars since then.
Will Ponniyin Selvan: Part Two make sense if I haven’t seen the first one?
AV Club didn’t review them but both Sisu and Polite Society were great. I highly recommend both as palate cleansers for next week’s superhero fatigue discourse.
Disagree! ‘Polite Society’ was ‘EEAO II: Indian Redux.”‘Sisu’ was a snooze in the middle part. And then it just became laughable when the action to the skies.
Doesn’t this place review everything that gets a theatrical release? When did that stop?
Seconded on Polite Society (haven’t seen Sisu)! It was very fun and funny. I know there are plenty of We Are Lady Parts fans on the AV Club who should check it out. It’s a bummer that it apparently didn’t do well in its per screen average—I think it suffered from a lack of marketing. I saw exactly one ad for it and most people probably aren’t aware of it.
“a movie title that sure has a lot of punctuation in it” and one more word than you reported in the main text.
Are There God? It’s Me, Margaret., a movie title that sure has a lot of punctuation in itAnd even more words than you bothered to include
I assume it’s RotJ: Special Edition, so more of a CGI Sy Snootles 90s vibe, yeah?
Also, who’s putting Star Wars back in cinemas?
Somehow, Star Wars has returned.
No nostalgia-cash-grab’s ever really gone
Disney?
It’s the 40th anniversary.
The George Foreman film suffered because by the time people had finished asking for a ticket with the full title they’d missed the session.
I don’t really think of the 80s as being “chill”, other than that movie the Big Chill. in fact in the 80s we were so unchill that it wasn’t uncommon for people to be told to chill out or take a chill pill