Daily Times

With the final numbers now in, the Forbes magazine reported that “Mission: Impossible – Fallout” earned $61.23 million in North America and $94.6m overseas in its first 36 overseas territories. That represents a $155.83m global cume in North America and around 40% of its eventual overseas footprint. It has scored the biggest opening weekend of the franchise both domestically and outside of North America. The overseas figure is a whopping 23% ahead of Mission: Impossible Rogue Nation. If that continues (and that’s not remotely guaranteed), then we may be looking at a $600m overseas total for the $180m-budgeted Paramount/Viacom Inc. action sequel.

So, yes, even with an improved-but-not-superlative domestic debut (it sold fewer tickets this weekend than Rogue Nation in 2015 and the allegedly disappointing Mission: Impossible III in 2006), it still might qualify as something of a breakout sequel for the 22-year old franchise. Yes, inflation, exchange rates and overseas market expansion plays as much of a role in the overseas grosses as does inflation in the domestic totals. But we could still end up with an overall total that’s awfully close to the $788m cume (in 2013 and without 3D) of Fast and Furious 6.

The film’s domestic weekend-to-final multiplier will likely end up somewhere between Star Trek Beyond (2.68x) and Rogue Nation (3.5x), which in turn puts the film’s domestic total somewhere between $164 million and $217m. That’s a lot of wiggle room, and a multiplier like Spectre (2.84x), Jason Bourne (2.74x) or even Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2.9x) gives the flick a $165-$180m domestic total. Conversely, a leggy run like Rise of the Planet of the Apes (3.22x) gives the movie a $198m domestic total, with the option for Paramount to Spectre that sucker until it gets past $200m.

Published in Daily Times, August 1^st 2018.