“Mamma Mia!” In the American box office, “The Super Mario Bros. Movie” continues to reign supreme.
From 4,371 screens, the Universal film added a commanding $22.6 million on Friday. On its second tour, “Super Mario Bros.” added 28 more venues after scoring the largest opening weekend of the year.
The Universal, Illumination, and Nintendo co-production is currently expecting a three-day total of $80 million, a remarkable 45% decline from its $146 million opening weekend. Seldom does a blockbuster film with a $100 million opening weekend lose less than 50% of that money in its second weekend? “Mario Bros.” is holding its ground better than “Minions: The Rise of Gru” (-56.9%) and “Strange World” (-58.2%) when compared to other recent family entertainment.
Since “Puss in Boots: The Last Wish” debuted in theaters in December, families haven’t had a big movie specifically geared for them, but the animated adventure’s continued potency shows that go beyond endearing them. The widespread popularity of “Mario Bros.” and positive word-of-mouth among ticket buyers are driving up the movie’s box office success. The Nintendo adaptation is predicted to be neck-and-neck with “Incredible 2” ($80.3 million) and not far behind the record-holder “Frozen 2” ($85.9 million) in terms of the second-biggest sophomore weekend for an animated picture.
On Friday, “Super Mario Bros.” surpassed the $500 million mark worldwide. The movie, which is also the greatest video game adaption in history, has surpassed “Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantum of Solace” ($474 million) to become the highest-grossing title of 2023. The animated adventure is still very much in the game in terms of its box office odyssey, even with such a little decline in its second weekend.
Chris Pratt, Charlie Day, Anya Taylor-Joy, and Jack Black voice the legendary Nintendo characters in “The Super Mario Bros. Movie,” which was directed by Aaron Horvath and Michael Jelenic. The movie had a $100 million production budget. Most reviewers didn’t like it; on the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, just 41% of the best critics gave it a favourable rating.
The “Mario Bros.” performance could help Universal, which is also releasing “Renfield” this weekend to underwhelming numbers. The monster comedy, which stars Nicholas Hoult as his devoted servant and Nicolas Cage as Dracula, made $3.1 million on Friday from 3,375 screens. We expect the movie to make $7.5 million at the box office, which is hardly the performance a studio would like from an action-packed genre movie with a $65 million budget. The first set of ticket buyers for “Renfield” were unimpressed, as evidenced by the film’s “B-” grade from the research company Cinema Score. Reviews were unaffected as well, with top critics of Rotten Tomatoes giving it a 40% approval rating.
The more sombre new horror film “The Pope’s Exorcist,” which stars Russell Crowe as the Catholic Church’s most dependable fixer, is outpacing the vampire screwball. At 3,178 locations, the Screen Gems film brought in $3.46 million on Friday. The religious thriller from Sony earned $8.6 million in its first weekend, placing it at No. 2 on the domestic charts. The movie has a less expensive $18 million production budget than “Renfield.”
“John Wick: Chapter 4” appears to land at No. 4, with projections for a $7.3 million haul over the course of its fourth weekend in theatres. Through Sunday, the Thunder Road Films and 87eleven Entertainment co-production should bring its domestic total to $159 million, edging closer to its 2019 predecessor’s $171 million total.
The fifth-placed “Air” from Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer is expected to experience a 49% decline from its $14 million three-day launch last weekend. It is a stronghold of the Ben Affleck-directed sports industry thriller, demonstrating its appeal to the masses. Yet the movie from Amazon Studios cost $90 million to make, plus millions more for marketing and promotion. The streamer will try to get the most out of “Air” by watching it on Amazon Video.
“Suzume,” which debuts this weekend, is expected to make $4.7 million from 2,170 locations. The Japanese movie, which was distributed by Sony’s Crunchyroll anime label, is benefiting from slightly increased ticket costs in a few Imax theatres and other premium formats. The criminal comedy “Mafia Mamma,” starring Toni Collette, is hustled to a $2.3 million launch from 2,002 screens. The sports drama “Sweetwater” is expected to only bring in a meagre $308,000 from 1,204 cinemas.
Before expanding in the upcoming weeks, “Beau Is Scared” is getting a limited release on four screens in New York and Los Angeles. In addition to premium ticket prices for Imax theatres, director Ari Aster’s fan base loyalty, and a WTF-factor that has sparked a range of vocal reactions among the first round of moviegoers, the dark comedy epic—which marks A24’s most expensive production to date—are all contributing to the success of the film.
All of these points to “Beau Is Scared” having a solid limited release and possibly posting one of the greatest per-theatre averages since the pandemic’s start. The Whale ($60,000 PTA) and record-holder “Licorice Pizza” ($86,289 PTA) are projected to contend with it, according to current forecasts.