Box office preview: ‘The Flash,’ ‘Elemental,’ ‘The Blackening’ will keep the summer movie love going

After strong releases to kick off the month of June, three more wide releases will try to split up any potential business to give the summer box office a boost. This weekend should also benefit from Father’s Day on Sunday and the Juneteenth government holiday on Monday. Read on for Gold Derby’s box office preview.

The widest release of the weekend is Warner Bros’ “The Flash,” starring Ezra Miller and more, which ties some of Zack Snyder‘s DCEU movies (“Man of Steel,” etc.) into the upcoming plans by James Gunn, or so it’s been said. The movie has been plagued with problems almost going back to Miller’s casting for Snyder’s “Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice” in 2016, which includes various writers and directors coming on board and then leaving. The movie was also delayed a few times due to COVID, and then last year, Miller (who uses they/them pronounces) got themselves into trouble with a string of alleged crimes.

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Setting aside the problematic nature of Miller’s recent activities, the movie’s strongest selling point may be the fact that Michael Keaton is returning as Batman for the first time since Tim Burton‘s “Batman Returns” all the way back in 1992. Moviegoers have gotten used to Ben Affleck and Robert Pattinson underneath the cowl, but Keaton returning is a pretty big deal, as is the fact that Sashe Calle joins as a new take on Supergirl.

While it’s been a long road to get the Flash to the big screen (following a very popular, long-running show on the CW… in which Miller made a cameo), Batman continues to be DC’s most popular character in other media. Matt Reeves‘ “The Batman,” starring Pattinson, opened with $134 million in March 2022 and grossed $369.3 million in North America and $766 million globally. Other recent Batman movies have done similar business, as did 2016’s “Suicide Squad,” which merely included a cameo by Ben Affleck‘s Batman (who also appears in “The Flash.”)

The movie has generally received strong mixed-positive reviews with it being 71% on Rotten Tomatoes, and in this case, it will help greatly with anyone sitting on the fence about going. With the movie clinching premium format screens like IMAX, there’s little reason why this, too, can’t open close to or over $100 million this weekend in over 4,000 theaters. Tracking seems to have it considerably lower, but positive word-of-mouth will continue to spread as the movie is shown to audiences in advance of the weekend.

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Being released into a couple hundred fewer theaters is the Disney-Pixar Animation animated feature “Elemental,” which takes place in Element City where fire, water, air and wood characters are pretty much keeping to themselves. In that world, a fire woman named Ember (voiced by Leah Lewis from “The Half Of It”) meets and falls for a water guy named Wade (Mamoudou Athie from “Jurassic World: Dominion”), leading to all sorts of issues.

“Elemental” premiered at the Cannes Film Festival in May to mixed reviews, but it has received stronger reviews since then to wind up with 80% on Rotten Tomatoes. Pixar has created a known brand among parents that makes them realize this is an appropriate movie for younger kids, but there’s also stuff for teens and older (even adults) with the love story at the movie’s core. Even so, it might be tough for Disney to give people confidence in the Pixar brand after so many movies being dumped to Disney+ over the past few years, and many already know they can just wait and watch the movie that way in a couple months. Because of this, it’s doubtful that “Elemental” will end up making more than $40 to 45 million, which puts it in a strong second place.

Third and fourth place should continue the battle between “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse” and “Transformers: Rise of the Beast,” although the former stands a good chance of pulling slightly ahead despite having direct competition from both “The Flash” AND “Elemental.”

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Opening in closer to 1,800 theaters is the horror-comedy “The Blackening,” directed by Tim Story (“Barbershop,” “Ride Along”), an ensemble movie about a group of Black friends who gather at a remote cabin for the Juneteenth weekend where they discover a board game called “The Blackening,” that expects them to pick the “Blackest” of them to die, as they’re terrorized by killers. The cast is a mixed bag of newcomers and vets, including Jermaine Fowler (“Coming 2 America”), Antoinette Robertson, Grace Byers, Sinqua Walls, Jay Pharoah and more.

“The Blackening” premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival last September where it was picked up by Lionsgate, and had a high-profile premiere at the Apollo Theater for the Tribeca Festival this week, and yet, somehow, Lionsgate has found a way to withhold most reviews so far. Regardless of reviews, this is likely to find a very specific audience of Black moviegoers that enjoy horror and comedy, which could lead to an opening weekend in the $8 to 10 million region. (We should bear in mind that Monday is the Juneteenth government holiday, which could help the movie similar to how Martin Luther King Jr. weekend has helped other movies, including a few of Story’s.)

Wes Anderson‘s new movie, “Asteroid City,” featuring another rogues’ gallery of an ensemble cast, this time including Scarlett Johansson, Tom Hanks, Bryan Cranston, and many more, will get a platform into New York and L.A. this weekend. It debuted at the Cannes Film Festival last month and has received mixed-positive reviews with plans for it to expand nationwide on Friday, June 23. We’ll have more about it next week.

Check back on Sunday to see how all the movies above fare, although it may be a little later than usual.

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