The Surprise Summer Hit? ‘Me and Earl and the Dying Girl’ Has Strong Opening Weekend

Yeah, yeah, yeah. We know Jurassic World dominated the box office this past weekend. It smashed the global record by taking in over $500 million worldwide during its opening weekend. It’s safe to say that it was a huge success. I watched it Thursday night and absolutely loved it, mainly because I was watching it inside an IMAX theater, and I was surrounded by my friends.

It was the perfect summer blockbuster, but it certainly wasn’t a perfect film. What do I mean by that? I mean that you wouldn’t have enjoyed the movie if you were watching it inside your bedroom on your laptop screen. You have to get the full ‘movie experience’ to truly enjoy Jurassic World.

A perfect great film can be enjoyed anywhere. Some of the best movies from last year, Whiplash, Boyhood, Gone Girl, Birdman, can be appreciated on any screen. You could watch those movies on a cracked iPad in the middle of another troubling Thanksgiving dinner with your family, and you would still walk away from the dinner table thinking, “Damn…that movie was great!”

Me and Earl and the Dying Girl has a chance to be one of those movies. The touching story about a pair of high school film-lovers who befriend a girl with cancer, won big at the 31st Sundance Film Festival awards, taking home both the U.S. dramatic audience award and the grand jury prize.

The praise made Fox Searchlight confident in a summer release for the film, and this past weekend the studio decided to release it inside 15 theaters. It earned $210,000, and was the top-grossing release in three theaters in Chicago, Brooklyn, and Washington, D.C.

It didn’t break any records, but Frank Rodriguez, senior vice president of distribution at Searchlight, is extremely happy with the numbers…

We felt the film was strong enough to go in the summer. There was no indication [‘Jurassic World’] would do $200 million, and that kind of sucked up all the air, but there was still space for us and we got the press and reviews we needed.

Thanks to the limited release success, the studio is expanding the release this week. The film will be added to 10 new markets, which will make it available at around 70 theaters. By July 1, the studio plans to have it screening in 600 to 700 locations.

You can check out a trailer for the movie below. Please go support it.