Weekend news roundup 27/11: Box Office latest, Hamilton concerns & more

Monday 27 November 2023 by Jonathan Victoria  News

Hamilton concerned for 2024 F1 season

Lewis Hamilton has already expressed concerns for the 2024 season in regards to Red Bull and their dominance once again in the season finale.

Max Verstappen comfortably won his 19th race of the season, beating second-placed Charles Leclerc by 17 seconds.

Speaking after the race, Hamilton, who has now gone two straight seasons without a win, was rather downbeat in his performance and with the team’s chances next season, saying:

“At this moment, I don't really know [about next year]. For Red Bull to win by 17 seconds and they haven't developed their car since August is definitely a concern,”

Team boss Toto Wolff was more positive for next year, saying that the team are motivated and have good things in the pipeline for their 2024 challenger.

Hunger Games prequel tops the weekend box office

The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes retained the top spot at the box office over the weekend*, beating the newcomers of Napoleon and Disney’s Wish.

The Hunger Games sequel brought in $28.8m domestically in its second week to take its domestic total up to $98.4m and has amassed $197.2m globally.

Ridley Scott’s new Napoleon biopic opened to a $20.4m domestic total, while Wish brought in $19.5m domestically.

Napoleon, featuring Joaquin Phoenix in the titular role, was number one in Great Britain and many other European nations, bringing in $6.6m from the UK alone. In its first weekend, it has made $78.8m globally so far.

*Standard three-day weekend. Not including extended five-day Thanksgiving weekend.

Italy wins Davis Cup

Italy have been crowned the 2023 Davis Cup champions after beating Australia 2:0 in the final.

World number four-ranked Jannik Sinner turned to Saint to lift his nation over the Aussies after he beat world number 12 Alex de Minaur in straight sets.

It was a great tournament for Sinner specifically, helping take out Serbia and in particular the great Novak Djokovic in both their singles and doubles matches during the Semi-Finals.

SAG-AFTRA release contract that ended actors’ strike

SAG-AFTRA has released the full 129-page contract that ended the actors’ strike, detailing the terms that have been agreed for the workers.

SAG-AFTRA national executive director and chief negotiator Duncan Crabtree-Ireland wrote a few comments following the documents’ release, saying:

“These contracts achieve more than $1 billion in NEW compensation and benefit plan funding (including an additional $317.2 million to the benefit plans),

"The contracts establish lengthy and detailed AI guardrails that didn’t exist before and do protect you as we meet the challenge of this new technology, hair and makeup equity, significantly increased background coverage, outsized streaming residuals, a new streaming success fund, and so much more.

“These gains are only possible because of your sacrifice, solidarity and tenacity over the 118 days of the strike and are assured if you vote to ratify the agreement."

Kane already making history

Harry Kane continues to dominate in the German Bundesliga, scoring his 18th goal of the season in 12 games in Bayern’s 1-0 win over Cologne.

Kane’s total sees him already surpass the record for most goals by an Englishman in a Bundesliga season, and at the rate he’s going, he won’t stop anytime soon.

The former Tottenham talisman is currently averaging 1.5 goals a game for the German champions. If he continues at that, he will finish the season with 51 goals.

That would not only break the record for most goals scored by an Englishman in the Bundesliga (39 by Tony Woodcock) but would smash the Bundesliga record for most goals in a season, which is set at 41 by Robert Lewandowski in the 2020/21 season.