Will Smith puts Fifty Shades of Grey out of focus

This is Smith’s first film in nearly two years after his last release proved to be a box-office dud.

Will Smith’s new action drama Focus booted Fifty Shades of Grey for its perch atop US and Canadian weekend box office charts, racking up $19.1 million in ticket sales, reported Reuters.

Smith, in his first leading role since 2013’s After Earth, plays a seasoned con artist who meets up with an aspiring con artist, played by Margot Robbie, in the romance-caper film hybrid.

According to the Daily Mail, though the film had a smaller box office opening in comparison to Smith’s other films, it managed to do enough to dismantle Fifty Shades of Grey from the top spot. Focus is Smith’s first film in nearly two years after his last release After Earth proved to be a box office dud.

Warner Bros have refrained from comparing the movie with other Will Smith movies believing that unlike them, Focus will be a slower financial success.

Kingsman: The Secret Service, an adaptation of a popular comic series, which stars Samuel L Jackson and Colin Firth, about a spy agency’s training program and a global threat by a tech genius, also outpaced Fifty Shades of Grey to claim second place with $11.8 million.

Third place on a weekend that saw business hampered by rough winter weather in the south and Midwest again went to the family-friendly The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge Out of Water, based on the popular television show about a talking animated sponge. It sold $11.2 million in tickets.

Fifty Shades of Grey, the smash hit adaptation of the best-selling novel, which stars James Dornan and Dakota Johnson as the libidinous couple, took in $10.9 million, landing in fourth from Friday through Sunday, according to studio estimates. The film is closing in on $148 million at the domestic box office since opening just over two weeks ago.

Rounding out the top five, The Lazarus Effect, which stars Mark Duplass and Olivia Wilde as researchers trying to resurrect the dead, took the No 5 spot on its opening weekend with $10.6 million in sales.

“This was a rather slow weekend at the box office,” said Paul Dergarabedian, senior media analyst at box office tracking firm Rentrak, noting that Oscar winners such as Still Alice and Birdman had received a good boost from Sunday’s awards.

“The severely inclement weather in the south and midwest threw off our number,” said Jeff Goldstein, executive vice president of domestic distribution for Warner Bros, the Time Warner unit that released Focus.

“When you look at the markets not hit by weather, we did really well,” Goldstein said, adding that the film had played especially well with younger audiences, where “word of mouth will really help.”

International box office would further boost the film’s fortunes, Goldstein said.

Comcast Corp’s Universal Pictures released Fifty Shades of Grey. Kingsman: The Secret Service was released by 20th Century Fox, the unit of 21st Century Fox. The SpongeBob Movie was distributed by Paramount Pictures, a unit of Viacom Inc.

Published in The Express Tribune, March  3^rd,  2015.

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