Black Adam retained the top spot for a third week in a row with a reported $18.5 million (a bit of ahead of our predictions) representing just a 33% drop from last week, with a $137 million running total. That may sound impressive, yet when you dig deeper you realize that, with an estimated $200 million budget before any sort of marketing costs, Black Adam needs to hit close to $500 million before the studio can see any sort of profit. In reality, that number is probably closer to $600 million when you factor in all the back end deals.
Indeed, the movie will be relying on foreign gross to break even. Generally comic book films and especially films starring Dwayne Johnson (as he has a huge international presence) can count on big bucks from the China market. All seemed to be going great in that regard. It had been leaked (but never confirmed) that Black Adam would see a Chinese release on November 11, however that date was the day that Black Panther: Wakanda Forever was set to get a world wide release everywhere except China. Apparently Marvel fans in China were not too pleased about this news and began making the Chinese film board aware that one of the stars of Black Adam (Pierce Brosnan) is a supporter of the Dalai Lama, which is apparently a big no no to the Chinese government (I’m not as up to date on my world news as I should be!) So now it appears Black Adam will also be banned in China and with that ban, there goes any chance of Black Adam hitting the numbers needed to be considered a success.
Second place will belong to the Crunchyroll Studios release of One Piece Film: Red with $9.4 million. This number is a far cry from the studios previous effort: Dragon Ball Super: Super Hero that released back in August to over $20 million, but is still a solid North American opening for an IP I bet many of us are unfamiliar with. As with other films in the top ten this week, One Piece Film: Red has already made its bank overseas where it is one of Japan’s highest opening films ever, so the stateside release is just putting some cherries on that sundae!
Third place will belong to Julia Roberts and George Clooney in Ticket To Paradise with $8.5 million representing just a 14% drop from last week. The film is playing on solid word of mouth and with no real light hearted comedies in the pipeline, I can see this one continuing to leg out to a solid domestic finish. Much like One Piece Film: Red, Ticket To Paradise is already a massive hit worldwide, so these stateside numbers are really just the hot fudge on top of the cherries on top of that sundae!
With the spooky season behind us, it was expected that the horror films that dominated the top ten over the past few weeks would start to decline, yet Smile seems to continue to chug along losing just 26% of its audience for a $4 million finish this weekend. The film stands at $99.1 million after 6 weeks of release and will hit the magical hundred million domestic mark any day now (while overseas it is nearing the $200 million mark.)
Posting a decent hold for a horror film is Prey For The Devil losing 46% of its audience for a $3.8 million finish. With a C+ cinemascore and horrid critical reviews (except the one from our own Iceman) the film will continue to drop as the market place gets more flooded.
Entering the top ten this week is The Banshees of Inisherin in 7th place with $2 million. The film which reunites the In Bruges team of Martin McDonagh, Brendan Gleeson and Colin Farrell is receiving tons of praise, including a rare perfect review from our own Chris Bumbray. If I may add to it, the script and acting are nothing short of masterful. The two leads kill it as always, but you add an amazing performance by Kerry Condon and a performance by Barry Keoghan that is both hilarious and heartbreaking and deserving of recognition once award nominations start rolling out, and you have a film that is a true masterclass in acting. With a slow roll out and a solid 85% Audience score (with a 97% Fresh rating), Banshees should have a solid hold through Awards season, as long as the adult audience makes its way back to theaters.
The other prestige expansion this weekend was Armageddon Time which failed to really wow at the box office, not even cracking the top ten with $810,000 for the weekend, which breaks down to just $805 per theater. This one may prove too damn depressing for general audiences.
The remainder of the top ten is filled out with holdovers Lyle, Lyle, Crocodile (6th place, $3.3 million), Till (8th place, $1.8 million), Halloween Ends (9th place, $1.4 million) and what I can assume will be the final weekend in the top ten for the surprise hit Terrifier 2 (10th place, 1.2 million)
Did you head out to theaters this weekend or are you waiting one more week for Black Panther: Wakanda Forever? Let us know in the comments. Don’t forget to check out our weekly poll, this week we lean in to the hilarious Roku Channel original Weird: The Al Yankovic story and ask what is your Favorite Music Biopic.