Box Office Report: “Beyond The Lights” Comes Up Short

This weekend, “Love and Basketball” writer and director Gina Prince-Bythwood unleashed her latest film, the celebrity-tinged romance, “Beyond The Lights.” But unfortunately, it had a light weekend at the box office.

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The film, starring Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Nate Parker, Minnie Driver, and Danny Glover, debuted in almost 2,000 theaters over the weekend, but only managed to take fourth place at the domestic box office, grossing approximately $6.5 million in three days. That’s considerably below Prince-Bythwood’s first movies. “Love and Basketball” raked in $8.1 million in its debut, and the 2008 adaptation of “The Secret Life of Bees,” grossed $10.5 million its opening weekend.

According to Box Office Mojo, the audience makeup for “Beyond The Lights” was 49% African-American, 61% female, and 55% over the age of 25. But even with its low gross, the film received high critical praise. It earned the coveted “A” grade from box office aggregator CinemaScore, which indicates that it will have strong financial legs over the coming weeks and will break even this week, given its low $7.2 million budget.

“Dumb and Dumber To” claimed first place this weekend with a gross of $38.05 million. It was the best opening weekend ever for the Farrelly Brothers, even better than “There’s Something About Mary” and the first “Dumb and Dumber” film. But the CinemaScore grade was a B-, indicating that audiences overall weren’t very impressed. Look for this one to be overtaken by “The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 1” or “Horrible Bosses 2” next weekend.

Check out the trailer for “Beyond The Lights” below!