By Saba Hamedy | Los Angeles Times
SETH MACFARLANE’S comedy Ted 2 fell short of tracking expectations with a $32.9-million launch as Jurassic World and Inside Out continued a tight race for No. 1 at the box office.
Universal Pictures’s dinosaur installment maintained its top spot for the third weekend in a row, collecting an additional $54.2 million in the US and Canada. With a domestic haul of $500 million to date, Jurassic World has now surpassed Avengers: Age of Ultron to become the top grossing film of 2015. Its worldwide total is a whopping $1.2 billion.
Pixar’s critically acclaimed hit Inside Out trailed closely behind in second with $52.1 million, a 42-percent drop from its opening last weekend. The animated feature has made $184.9 million domestically to date. Overseas, the film earned $81.5 million, bringing its worldwide total to $266.4 million.
Though Ted 2, another Universal Pictures release, opened at No. 3, the box-office haul was shy of the $54-million total of Ted three years ago. However, the film is off to a solid start considering it faced two tentpoles at the box office.
The sequel follows John (Mark Wahlberg) and his best friend, Ted, a potty-mouthed teddy bear (voiced by MacFarlane). This time around, Ted seeks help from a lawyer (Amanda Seyfried) and a civil-rights attorney (Morgan Freeman) so he and his new wife (Jessica Barth) can adopt a child.
Like its predecessor, the comedy attracted largely male audiences. An estimated 51 percent of audiences 25 and older and 59 percent were male. It earned a “B+” rating from audience polling firm CinemaScore.
With no other new R-rated comedies coming into the marketplace for the next three weeks, Universal expects continued playability for the comedy.
Internationally, the comedy collected $20.3 million in 26 territories including Germany, Russia, Australia and Taiwan. It will open in 38 more territories in the coming weeks. Max, another new entry at the domestic box office, came in at No. 4 with $12.2 million. Boaz Yakin’s post-traumatic stress disorder canine picture, which was developed, financed and produced by MGM Studios, earned a solid “A” grade on CinemaScore. The Warner Bros. release played to mostly older, female audiences: An estimated 57 percent were over the age of 25 and 55 percent were females.
Meanwhile, in limited release, Warner Bros. documentary Batkid Begins earned $23,000 in four theaters, a per-location average of nearly $6,000.
If Sunday figures hold, the weekend will be up about 3 percent versus the same period a year ago when Transformers: Age of Extinction opened with $100 million.