The biopic about American rap group, “Straight Outta Compton“, had more than a strong opening in this weekend’s box office. The movie launched to an estimated $56.1 million, beating other newcomers. It also nabbed the best-ever opening for director F. Gary Gray and the best August opening for an R-rated movie as well as the top opening for a musical biopic.
“All good forms of art do more than just flatter you,” said Nick Carpou, Universal’s domestic distribution chief. “The more successful they are, the more they make you think about where you are in the world.” Carpou also said that the success of the movie was tightly connected to the phenomena of social media. “When you’ve got the principals behind the film followed by as many people as they are, that’s an extra factor,” Carpou noted. Ice Cube, for example, has 2.4 million Twitter followers, and he tweeted this morning, “Thank you for making us #1 this weekend.”
Centering on the origin story of hip-hop group N.W.A, the movie performed much better than other rap movies like Eminem‘s “8 Mile“, which bowed to $51.2 million in 2002, and “Notorious“, the story of Notorious B.I.G., which opened to $20.5 million in 2009.
