It almost feels like an election-like déjà vu, there’s a candidate that’s objectively terrible, he’s been roasted in the media, but the public has completely different perspective. Sony’s “Venom” was a smash hit this weekend; the film defeated the most poisonous of critical reviews and still earned an $80 million domestic opening, the company’s second-biggest non-“Spider-Man” debut after Bond film “Skyfall” ($88M in 2012). “Venom” features a decidedly bad Rotten Tomatoes score (32%), but audiences didn’t seem to care (in fact, the populist audience score on RT is 89%). “Venom” smashed records too, demolishing the previously held highest grossing October opening— the $55.8 million launch of “Gravity”—by 43%.
Without tentpole competition or any superhero adversaries in sight, “Venom” generally took down the playing field, despite many reviews that described the film as laughable (including ours). Internationally, “Venom” scored $125 million worldwide, for a $205 million global opening (the biggest opening in box office history for October worldwide). The opening is on the lower end (a little bit higher than “Ant-Man & The Wasp,” but lower than “Thor: The Dark World”) of, say Marvel movies, an analogous studio one cannot help compare it to—15 of 20 Marvel movies grossed higher than “Venom” in their domestic box office weekends—but nevertheless, it’s a terrific start for a movie that was critically roasted.
Is the franchise next? It’s very possible. The second and third weeks should tell the tale, but at this point, Sony should be feeling very happy. Some pundits are expecting a precipitous box-office drop in week two, but if “Venom” can make it to $400M worldwide, surely a sequel will be greenlit soon if the numbers bear out that kind of tracking (and “Venom” only cost $100 million which is relatively modest by superhero movie standards). Sony’s Spiderverse, which has faced several false starts (see “Silver & Black” falling apart, but before that the entire “Amazing Spider-Man” series), looks like it finally has a shot of becoming a reality. Will the Venom vs. Carnage sequel happen? Will Venom finally crossover with “Spider-Man”? Time will tell.
Meanwhile, on the opposite spectrum, this weekend was killer for non-superhero movies too. Bradley Cooper’s ravishingly-received “A Star Is Born” with Lady Gaga scored a $42.6 million opening—a fabulous number for a music drama. That makes for an opening 15% higher than the box office weekend of 2015 when Matt Damon’s “The Martian” helped set a $151.5 million record for that frame. A sure fire Oscar contender in multiple categories, Picture, Director, Actor, Actress, consider this the start of a careful build that’s going to grown and continue through early 2019 and beyond depending if/when the movie wins any significant plaudits.
Elsewhere, the box office was relatively unremarkable, at least compared to these highlights, but of note is the -76% drop of “The Predator” in its fourth week. This is supposed to be a franchise film that hasn’t even cracked $50 million domestically yet and will definitely fall out of the top 10 by next weekend. Chalk that one up to a big flop for Fox. “Crazy Rich Asians” is almost at $170 million domestically ($225M worldwide), “The Nun” is well over the $100 million mark now ($346M ww), and while you weren’t looking, “A Simple Favor” went on to make $50 million at home and “Christopher Robin” nearly hit the $100 million mark.
What else is notable? Fox released “The Hate U Give” on 36 screens across the country, $500,000 for a $13K per screen average. “Mission: Impossible – Fallout” should likely be hitting the $800 million mark soon (a franchise first) and at $621M worldwide, “Ant-Man And The Wasp” has essentially outgrossed the first film by about $100 million.
Lastly, as you’ve likely heard the documentary “Free Solo” had an astounding limited release opening last weekend and became 2018’s per screen average winner so far. This weekend, the doc added 37 theaters and jumped 83.5% in grosses. Currently, at half a million and change, it should soon hit that figure and will undoubtedly rise—this one has Best Documentary Oscar nominations written all over it.
1. Venom — Sony — $80,030,000
2. A Star is Born —Warner Bros. — $41,250,000
3. Smallfoot —Warner Bros.— $14,900,000 ($42,760,945)
4. Night School — Uni. — $12,275,000 ($46,750,355)
5. The House With A Clock In Its Walls — Uni. — $7,295,000 ($55,050,560)
6. A Simple Favor — Lionsgate — $3,435,000 ($49,014,356)
7. The Nun— Warner Bros. — $2,610,000 -($113,367,310)
8. Hell Fest — LGF — $2,075,000 ($8,864,476)
9. Crazy Rich Asians — WB — $2,060,000 ($169,134,942)
10. The Predator — Fox — $900,000 ($49,985,889)
