As a seasoned film enthusiast who has witnessed the ebb and flow of the cinematic landscape for decades, I must say this past October at the domestic box office left me feeling rather deflated. Having grown accustomed to the vibrant tapestry of films that traditionally grace our screens during this month, it’s disheartening to see such a disappointing showing this year.
Three years ago, the new comic book adaptation “Eternals,” with no prior fanbase, was projected to open domestically to over $100 million, just a month before its release. But after initial negative reviews came out, anticipation waned. Despite this, it still made $71 million in its first three days of North American screenings. Fast forward to 2024, “Venom: The Last Dance,” a sequel to two movies that each earned over $85 million during their domestic opening weekends, managed only a $51 million debut. While “Deadpool” and “Wolverine” have shown that superhero films can still draw huge box office numbers, the days of every Marvel and DC Comics adaptation being an instant event are now past.
In terms of initial earnings among superhero movie premieres in the U.S., “The Last Dance” outperformed Sony/Marvel’s “Ghost Rider,” which was released 17 years ago, by nearly $6 million. However, it fell short compared to the North American openings for films like “Green Lantern,” “The Wolverine,” “Shazam!,” “The Lego Batman Movie,” and “Watchmen.
In contrast to a less-than-spectacular debut, “The Last Dance” premiered with 41% fewer viewers than “Venom: Let There Be Carnage” managed three years prior. This was partially due to the lack of marketing focus on introducing a fresh, exciting villain for Venom to battle. The previous film showcased its most renowned adversary, Carnage, played by an Oscar-nominated actor (Woody Harrelson). On the other hand, “The Last Dance” trailer heavily emphasized CGI aliens and a lesser-known comic book villain, Knull, whose identity was kept secret until the last minute. The absence of familiar franchise elements like Michelle Williams also made “The Last Dance” feel somewhat detached from its predecessors. Moreover, the “Venom” films were not particularly well-received by audiences in the past.
Who can predict what will happen with superhero movies like Superman and The Fantastic Four: First Steps next year? With their well-known lead characters, they might just make it. However, less popular titles such as Thunderbolts are facing an uphill battle against apathy towards more superhero films in the U.S. Let’s hope for Kraven the Hunter, the upcoming Sony/Marvel production. If a third Venom film managed to earn only $51 million on its domestic opening weekend in 2024, then Kraven, which apparently costs more than The Last Dance (!?), is going to need an extraordinary boost at the box office.
Coming in second during the recent box office was “Smile 2”, last weekend’s top-grossing domestic film. In this week, it earned an additional $9.4 million, representing a decrease of 59% from its strong opening. To date, the movie has brought in a total of $40.7 million over a 10-day period. It’s evident that “Smile 2” won’t have as long a run as its original, but it is expected to still generate substantial profits for Paramount Pictures, given its budget of $28 million.
In this week, only one significant new film, “Conclave,” premiered alongside “Venom: The Last Dance.” This adult drama managed a strong start, earning $6.5 million from only 1,753 theaters. As a result, it narrowly missed out on being the year’s second-largest domestic launch for films debuting in fewer than 2,000 theaters, trailing behind “The Forge.” Focus Features, which has faced numerous challenges this year with only one new wide release (“The Bikeriders”) surpassing $10 million, will find solace in “Conclave’s” success. In comparison to previous Focus releases, “Conclave” significantly surpassed the biggest single domestic weekend for “The Holdovers” and outperformed the largest single domestic weekend for “The Darkest Hour.” Its opening was also 8% higher than the domestic debut of “On the Basis of Sex” in January 2019.
In contrast to studios like Warner Bros., who are reluctant to release major theatrical presentations of dramas such as Juror #2, movies like Conclave serve as a potent reminder that compelling and relatable award season films can still attract audiences to cinemas. In 2024, the key to making these films successful is much the same as it was in 1994: ensure they are relevant and engaging. People don’t flock to movie theaters because a film is “important”; rather, they go because it appears intriguing to watch. The advertisements for Conclave, highlighting an enthralling plot (the pope has died, and there’s a conspiracy to determine his successor) and a tense atmosphere, successfully piqued interest. Furthermore, the presence of a younger demographic at my Thursday night screening of Conclave indicates that this film wasn’t just appealing to older audiences, which is crucial for any arthouse production.
As a passionate admirer, it’s challenging to predict how Conclave will fare in the upcoming weeks given its immediate wide release. Adding more cinemas in subsequent weeks might prove difficult, but if word-of-mouth buzz is positive, there’s a strong possibility that this film could join the exclusive club of only 36 Focus Features movies to gross over $25 million domestically.
Following that was “The Wild Robot,” maintaining another impressive weekend-to-weekend hold, dropping only 36%. It earned an additional $6.5 million, bringing its domestic total to a robust $111.3 million. With predictions of a domestic total between $130 and $140 million for this unexpected success, it’s shaping up to be a significant hit. After a successful wide-release expansion last weekend, A24 expanded the theater count for “We Live in Time” this week to an impressive 2,964 locations. One of A24’s widest releases ever, “We Live in Time” grossed another $4.8 million this frame, a 15% increase from last weekend. With an $11.7 million domestic haul so far, “We Live in Time” has become the first 2024 limited release to surpass $10 million domestically. If it maintains its performance in the next two weekends, it could potentially join the elite group of only 14 A24 titles that have reached $20 million in North America.
Terrifier 3 eased 49% this weekend, grossing another $4.7 million. It’s no Greatest Showman or Elemental in its weekend-to-weekend holds. However, Terrifier 3 is still showing solid retention for such a brutally graphic movie. The lifetime domestic total of Art the Clown’s latest adventure is $44.4 million. Beetlejuice Beetlejuice refuses to die as it eased just 35% this frame to add another $3.5 million. Its domestic haul now stands at a massive $289 million. After that Tim Burton movie, the holdovers get downright frightening. Countless titles had steep drops this weekend as they lost screens to Venom, Conclave, and Time.
In its second week of screening, the movie “Anora” proved resilient, outperforming expectations by earning an additional $867,142 from 34 theaters. This translates to a per-theater average of $25,504, which is 10% higher than the second weekend per-theater average of “Moonlight” from October 2016. It also surpasses the second weekend per-theater averages of “Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri,” and “Jojo Rabbit.” The strong performance of “Anora” is particularly encouraging as it mirrors pre-COVID arthouse breakout hits. Remarkably, despite being screened in fewer theaters than its competitors, it managed to rank among the top ten highest-grossing movies in America this weekend. This suggests that the distributor Neon could be on track for a significant crossover hit. To date, “Anora” has grossed $1.61 million domestically after only ten days of release.
Moving on to some troubling updates, the film “Piece by Piece” saw a significant 65% drop over the weekend, earning $720,110. To date, it has made $8.83 million domestically. Following close behind was “Transformers: One,” which earned $720,000 this weekend, marking a 64% decrease from its previous week’s earnings. So far, this animated spin-off has amassed $57.9 million. The release of another comic book movie dealt yet another blow to “Joker: Folie a Deux,” which dropped 72% this weekend, grossing an additional $600,000. With only $57.8 million after 24 days in theaters, “Folie a Deux” is quickly becoming one of the most frontloaded major releases ever at the domestic box office. At least it managed to surpass the domestic earnings of “Shazam! Fury of the Gods” this weekend? That’s about as good as it gets for them.
On the eve of Halloween, The Substance earned an additional $605,500 (a decrease of 31% compared to its previous release), making it one of the year’s most significant wide releases with a domestic gross of $14.5 million so far. However, the momentum behind Saturday Night appears to have waned, as it experienced a 66% drop this weekend and added only an extra $575,000 to its total. With a current domestic gross of $8.7 million, it seems that the anticipated film about the first episode of Mad TV might fare better. Despite their efforts, Vertical Entertainment, the distributor, is still struggling to establish itself as a significant independent label. The debut of Your Monster, featuring Melissa Barrera, unfortunately did not meet expectations, opening to only $515,000 from 651 locations and averaging a disappointing $791 per theater.
Last weekend, the film “Goodrich” didn’t find success in its second run, dropping by 74% to earn $165,260. So far, it has made only $1.21 million domestically. On the other hand, “Memoir of a Snail” started its limited release this weekend, making $69,000 in five cinemas, which averages to $13,800 per theater. As reported by IndieWire, “Dahomey” made approximately $18,879 from two theaters, averaging $9,440 per screen. Meanwhile, “Union” expanded to four theaters and earned $16,150, averaging $2,307 per location. After ten days, its total domestic gross stands at $43,234. Lastly, the documentary film “Black Box Diaries” made a debut of $7,000 from a single cinema.
This past weekend, the highest-earning films only brought in $88 million collectively. This rather lackluster total marks a disappointing close to October at the domestic box office, which had pinned its hopes on only two comic book adaptations – Joker: Folie a Deux and Venom: Let There Be Carnage. The decision to base the entire month’s strategy around these two movies was questionable from the start. However, it became increasingly apparent that major studios made a poor choice by clearing their release schedules to avoid competing with these titles when both of them performed so poorly. In comparison, 11 years ago, blockbusters like Gravity, Captain Phillips, and Jackass Presents: Bad Grandpa all thrived simultaneously. Even as far back as 2018, Venom and A Star is Born managed to succeed when they debuted on the same weekend.
In the market, it’s possible for numerous films, not just a couple of anticipated comic book movies, to thrive. The popularity of “Conclave” and “We Live in Time” demonstrates that there is a demand for original, grounded dramas on the big screen, similar to “Moneyball” or “The Girl on the Train,” even from major studios. Unfortunately, October 2024 lacked such hits. With an over-emphasis on sequels and a limited number of new releases, October 2024 has only managed to earn about $420 million so far, making it unlikely to reach the $469 million earned in October 2022. Consequently, October 2024 is shaping up to be the least profitable post-2020 October domestically of the decade thus far.
As of now in 2024, the domestic earnings for movies amount to $6.6 billion. However, there’s exciting anticipation surrounding Thanksgiving, as blockbusters like “Gladiator II”, “Moana 2”, and “Wicked” are expected to make it a huge event for cinemas. Nonetheless, over-reliance on big-budget movies can be quite risky for theaters, as we’ve seen when films such as “Joker: Folie a Deux” failed to deliver the anticipated boost.
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2024-10-28 18:15