Nigerian Movie goers spend N3.2billion on box office movies, as joker becomes the highest grossing R-rated movie in history

Data provided by Cinema Exhibitors Association of Nigeria reveals that a massive N 3,266,317,614 has been spent by Nigerian movie goer,in the last nine months , the year has been very entertaining and mesmerizing as lots of folks flock to the cinema to catch the latest box office delight , from Jason Mamoa, dc super hero under water adventure Aquaman late entry in December 2018 to marvels Avengers Endgame record breaking debute in April 2019 ,all hands and pockets has been on deck projecting enough money to profit the hollywood box office, Voice Air Media reports.

JANUARY ended with a promising N77,259 ,811 with samuel el jacksons Glass ,chief daddy, Up North, started the year as major contributors to the total gross of January .

FEBUARY -totaled N291,843,044 with Valentine releases such as Alita (Battle Angel) ,Cold pursuit, What men want, Escape room and Kevin Hart flick the Upside.

MARCH doubled up with February earning with a N434,432,431 closing as Disney opened on their first Marvel female superhero lead Captain Marvel.

APRIL offered a lot of CGI action Blockbusters generating a thundering N734,151,060 a lot of which was hauled in by Avengers Endgame and in second place Dc ; David sandberg directed Shazam, Hellboy starring Dave harbour, Curse of LA llorona, Little ,closed with a huge dip and ended N367,498 554 mostly generated by end game which was released in late April other releases include Seth Rogen and Charlize Theron long shot.

JUNE picked up in its opening with John wick(parrabellum), warner brothers Godzilla : king of Monsters, Disney Aladdin, Anna , Men in Black, Bling Lagosians, X men Dark Phoenix opening at N161,132,714 and closed at N346,322,779 which was quite disappointing, despite most of the big box-office franchise jumping in the month of June.

JULY and AUGUST combined to pull in a massive N1.2 billion, the Disney super realistic remake of Lion King came in with a lot of hype ,merging with the sony/Disney superhero thriller Spider-Man far from home both movies soared in the Global box office with Lion King earning $1 651 891 209 and Spider-Man holding strong at $1 131 535 039 keeping them at the second and third highest grossing films of 2019 behind only Avengers Endgame, other openings for the month includes Fast and Furious : Hobbs and Shaw, Angel Has Fallen.

SEPTEMBER was not so promising as it dipped in N294,860 ,000 .There are series of wonderful October to December movies lined up and we would be reporting back as we gather those box office figures .

Warner Brothers on Friday ,has affirmed that Joker has dethroned Dead pool to become the highest grossing R-rated movie in history, a position previously held by Ryan Reynolds Deadpool which sat at $783 million global gross has passed the Crown to Todd Phillips directed version of the gritty DC villains Clown Prince of crime which is in its third week of release has hauled in $788 million it is estimated that Joaquin Phoenix joker will eclipse $1 billion at the worldwide box office, if it loses more screens as more competitors enters the box office $900 million minimum despite not opening in China, this is ridiculously profitable for a movie which had a $70million production budget.

It holds the record for highest October opening ever and also highest grossing R-rated movie in history, it has also won the Golden Lion award at Venice Film Festival 2019 and have strong Oscar buzz as well as Academy Award buzz.

James Izidor.

I write about the entertainment, Hollywood and Nollywood box office