As a seasoned film critic with years of experience under my belt, I must say, this week’s box office performance has left me feeling as flat as a pancake at a breakfast buffet. The lackluster offerings and the continuous streak of disappointing weekend grosses are giving me more cause for concern than a late-night call from a telemarketer.
With the stage ablaze, why not enjoy ourselves?” This phrase from one of the final songs in ‘Anna & The Apocalypse’ likely resonated with cinema-goers as they ventured to theaters following the recent Election Day. Over the weekend, the top movie in the U.S. amidst all this turmoil was ‘Venom: The Last Dance‘. Since ‘Hardball’ held the number one spot at the box office a week after 9/11, it is quite unusual for a film to be tasked with comforting America’s audiences like this one. Despite a 37% drop in numbers, ‘The Last Dance’ earned another $16.3 million, and after 17 days of domestic screenings, the total gross now stands at $115 million.
Despite initially struggling to catch up to its predecessors at the same stage in North America, The Last Dance has shown improvement following a rather underwhelming opening weekend. To clarify, it’s currently earning 2.28 times its initial earnings, indicating progress. Directed by Kelly Marcel, this production still holds potential for further financial success. It’s quite plausible that The Last Dance will leverage the grosses from Veteran’s Day and Thanksgiving week to barely surpass $150 million in North America.
In the year 2024, The Strangers: Chapter 1 boasted the largest domestic box office debut of any Lionsgate release. Surprisingly, The Best Christmas Pageant Ever came close, earning a respectable $11.1 million on its opening weekend. This new adaptation of the beloved children’s book matched the openings of pre-COVID Christmas films like Last Christmas and Why Him? , and even outperformed most recent Lionsgate Christian movie debuts. It’s worth noting that holiday-themed family movies often perform well over their entire domestic run. Even a film as poorly received as Fred Claus managed to earn 3.9 times its opening weekend total.
Given that situation, “The Best Christmas Pageant Ever” might stand a chance at earning $50 million domestically, making it the highest-grossing Lionsgate film of 2024, outperforming “The Strangers: Chapter 1”. Wow, what a disappointing year it’s been for this studio.
The film “Heretic” debuted with an estimated $11 million this weekend, which could potentially outperform “The Best Christmas Pageant Ever” and claim the title of biggest new release. This opening is 6% more than the start of A24’s horror movie “Talk to Me” from last year. Although it’s not a blockbuster hit, such earnings are respectable for an independent horror film. The movie “Heretic” faced intense competition from other horror releases in October and had a slightly intricate plot compared to movies like “Talk to Me”. However, compelling marketing materials and the allure of Hugh Grant portraying a menacing character attracted a good opening. The film maintained steady performances throughout the weekend.
This weekend, “The Wild Robot” maintained another strong box office performance with a revenue of $6.6 million, only dropping by 11% compared to last weekend. With a domestic total of $130.8 million so far, it’s showing potential to surpass $150 million if the upcoming releases of “Wicked” and “Moana 2” don’t outshine it at the end of the month. Meanwhile, “Smile 2” also held its ground this weekend despite a new horror movie entering the market. It grossed another $4.9 million, bringing its domestic total to $60.4 million after a 27% drop. “Conclave” continues its successful run in North America with $4 million earned over the weekend, experiencing a minimal 20% dip. With 17 days of screenings under its belt, it’s expected to remain on screens until Thanksgiving, potentially reaching higher domestic totals as a result.
Over the weekend, the movie “Anora” climbed up to the seventh position at the domestic box office. Interestingly, it’s the only film in the top ten that’s playing in fewer than 1,500 cinemas. This weekend alone, it raked in $2.45 million from 1,104 theaters, giving it an average of around $2,224 per theater during its initial wide release. This opening weekend performance is quite similar to that of “Parasite” back in November 2019, even though “Anora” was playing in 600 fewer theaters. To date, “Anora” has amassed a substantial $7.2 million.
In its second week, the film “Here” saw a decrease of 50% or approximately $2.42 million. While this isn’t a massive drop, it’s still not ideal for a movie that struggled significantly during its opening weekend. In the U.S., “Here” has made only $9.5 million so far. On the other hand, “We Live in Time” continued to perform well, with a 36% decrease in its fourth week of wide release. This resulted in another $2.2 million and a total domestic gross of $21.8 million. Completing the top ten was “Terrifier 3,” earning $1.3 million. The latest installment of Art the Clown’s adventures has made a total of $53.3 million in North America.
As a gamer, I ventured into four fresh gaming worlds that hit the screens this weekend, but none managed to make a lasting impact. The Anthony Mackie flick, “Elevation,” fell flat with only $1.18 million in 1,416 theaters. On the brighter side, “Overlord: The Sacred Kingdom” performed fairly well considering its limited theater count, raking in $1.1 million from just 621 locations. Now, let’s talk about the least impressive of this weekend’s wide releases – a title that came from Ketchup Entertainment.
Once again, a weekend has passed with Roadside Attractions’ latest release, Small Things Like These, failing to make an impact at the box office. Despite being shown in 799 locations and starring recent Oscar winner Cillian Murphy, it couldn’t attract enough audience, earning only $585,000 this weekend, which equates to a disappointing $732 per theater average. According to Deadline, the recent Ketchup Entertainment wide release, Weekend in Taipei, is expected to gross a meager $360,000 from 1,021 locations, making it one of the year’s poorest wide release debuts.
Over the past weekend, I was thrilled to see that “A Real Pain” expanded to 12 cinemas and raked in an impressive $282,000, giving each theater an average of $23,000. It’s holding strong, and I can’t wait to find out how it performs when it hits over 1,100 theaters this coming Friday! On the other hand, “Memoir of a Snail” didn’t fare as well during its expansion into more theaters, earning only $201,000 from 467 theaters, averaging $430 per theater. To date, this animated feature has grossed $374,848 domestically. In contrast, “Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point” had a disappointing debut in 405 theaters, taking home just $73,500, which amounts to only $181 per theater.
This weekend, Andrea Arnold’s film “Bird” premiered at a solitary cinema and raked in $24,104. On the other hand, “Dahomey” experienced a setback in its third weekend, as it relinquished control of three theaters and saw a 48% drop, earning an additional $8,028. Over the course of 17 days in domestic play, it has accumulated a total gross of $70,797.
Over the past two weekends, the top ten movies at the domestic box office have collectively earned just $60 million – an underwhelming amount. This marks the second consecutive weekend that earnings have fallen below $65 million, which is quite disappointing. The last time the top ten movies grossed over $85 million was during the final frame of October 2024, when “The Last Dance” premiered. Upcoming film “Red One” may slightly boost ticket sales next weekend, but it’s primarily up to “Wicked”, “Gladiator II”, and “Moana 2” to turn things around for this month. Unfortunately, there isn’t much expected from the Thanksgiving 2024 box office beyond these three films.
The upcoming week from November 22nd to 27th will only see the release of three new films, leading to a scarcity of fresh options in the market. Movies like “A Real Pain”, “Anora”, and “Conclave” are not likely to single-handedly make up for this shortage. It’s evident now that cinema owners must be patient until 2025 for a more consistent flow of new theatrical films, but even then, finding fresh projects could remain challenging. To get the box office back to its pre-COVID levels, studios need to continue releasing new movies, and ideally, a diverse range of them. I’ll just keep repeating it every weekend until that happens!
Is there any chance you could rephrase this sentence in a more natural and easy-to-understand way? Here’s my attempt: * Angel Studios will release “Bonhoeffer: Pastor. Spy. Assassin” on November 22, but it seems like not many people are aware that the movie is coming out.
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2024-11-11 16:15