Like a huntsman lurking around in the woods, Jason Statham’s A Working Man scared Disney’s Snow White into second place at the office, $15.2M to $14.2M.
At a time when feature production development executives have their faces in their hands, baffled at what works at the box office, let’s not deny the attraction of the tried and true meat and potatoes dude action movie, which can still find an audience. Keep in mind part of the allure her to after with this $40M Statham pic is it’s based on the Chuck Dixon book series about a retired counter-terrorism agent turned construction worker who’s pulled back into his old career. There are several books and ample Transporter opportunity for Statham in the near future. The screenplay was written by Sylvester Stallone and David Ayer, who directed the pic. The opening here isn’t far from Statham’s previous Ayer and Amazon MGM Studios reteam, The Beekeeper at $16.5M.
Also amid the jawdropping news about Jen Salke’s exit as Head of Amazon MGM Studios, it’s a nice win here for the studio which will be fortified product wise on the motion picture side by Warner Bros’ vet Courtenay Valenti
Snow White‘s $14.2M is a -66% plummet for the princess after $3.7M second Friday and $6.25M Saturday boosted by matinees. Very sad. Again, it’s a solid movie; but coupled with all the bad publicity, “Nobody is going! Nobody is going!” as a vet Hollywood producer loves to groan to me when movies tank. Snow White‘s drop is steeper than Dumbo‘s second frame (-60%), and makes Maleficent: Mistress of Evil‘s second weekend look rich at a -48% decline ($19.4M second weekend). Spring break is still in session on Monday with close to a third of K-12 schools off on Monday per ComScore.
Two horror movies, largely female skewing went after each other this weekend, with Blumhouse/Universal’s The Woman in the Yard having the upper hand at $9.45M over A24’s Death of a Unicorn with the hippest star for today’s generation’s Jenna Ortega trailing behind at $5.8M. Death of a Unicorn was made for $15M net while Woman in the Yard was $12M net.
Woman in the Yard drew 31% women over 25 and 24% women under 25 while Death of a Unicorn had 29% women over 25 and 20% female under 25.
How the hell did that happen? How did a film with no stars and a woman looking like she was in mourning defeat Wednesday? And Death in the Unicorn has the better grades with a B- to Woman in the Yard‘s C-.
When it comes to horror, straight up jump scare will usually win over any horror hybrid, the one sheet for Death of a Unicorn conveying Neverending Story. And yes, Death of a Unicorn is original IP, it’s not Beetlejuice or Scream, but still, if Harry Styles can propel Don’t Worry Darling to $19.3M, it seem that the digital marketing and non-outdoor ways of A24 didn’t sell Unicorn as a unicorn.
Universal’s marketing kicked ass in its jump scary wheat field, scary lady trailer, that towering billboard near Cahuenga, and the live stunt in theaters where the ladies in black were sitting in the lobby in front of the pic’s standees. This was a bigger bullhorn than A24 taking Death of a Unicorn to the studio’s stomping ground of SXSW to world premiere.
Woman in the Yard also had the bigger social media universe than Death of a Unicorn, 125.4M followers across all platforms to 64.3M, the latter -59% behind other horror pics before opening. And Unicorn had Ortega’s 38.6M followers. Statham was still taller than her with his 115.7M.
Despite the dull horn on Unicorn RelishMix found before the pic’s opening, “Convo on Death Of A Unicorn is running enthusiastically positive as fans are sold on the idea, ‘Good actors, new story, I’m in.’ plus, ‘This is not death of a unicorn, This Is death by unicorn.’ Franchise fatigue is well referenced, ‘Glad to see something other than a damn remake.’ Also, the cast is selling through, ‘Rudd, Ortega and murderous unicorns? Let’s go!!!’ Fans are up for some fun and spreading the word, “Am I the only one that searched about unicorn startups and suddenly jumped to this amazing trailer? jesus.. I loved it!..’ Who the hell knows. Maybe there’s an uptick tonight; A24 rarely opens movies north of double digits and this is slightly under the $6.5M 3-day opening of Midsommar, but damn, Heretic with 64-year old Hugh Grant opened to $10.8M. At the end of the day, around a $30M domestic take is where most of these A24 movies lay. Death of a Unicorn was made with a SAG interim agreement during the strike.
What wonder is missing in Death of a Unicorn? As Deadline film critic Glenn Garner pointed out at SXSW: “For a movie with a nearly two-hour runtime and a bonkers title with the plot to match, the action kicks off awfully late into the movie. Meanwhile, the laughs and gore are few and far between, and the satirical element ultimately takes a backseat to the father/daughter dynamic, which is heartfelt enough on its own… though we came for the unicorn bloodbath.”
Faith-based actually does seem to still work as Fathom’s The Chosen: Last Supper Part 1 booked at 2,235 locations did $5.1M Friday for a third place of $11.49M in 3rd place. It’s been a while since faith-based has put up good numbers like this. No CinemaScore, but 99% on Rotten Tomatoes popcorn meter which is higher than this weekend’s A Working Man (90%), Death of a Unicorn (74%) and Woman in the Yard (49%). Truly a celebratory moment to turn water into wine: it’s the biggest opening for a Chosen movie according to Comscore, higher than November 2022’s The Chosen: Season 3 which debuted to $8.77M.
The weekend is coming in around $79M for all movies, +5% over last weekend, but -42% off from a year ago, which was Easter weekend. That saw Legendary/Warner Bros’ Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire open to $80M and propel the frame to north of $152M.
Updated Sunday numbers below, indicated in bold.
1.) A Working Man (AMZ) 3,262 theaters, Fri $5.6M Sat $5.8M Sun $3.7M 3-day $15.2M/Wk 1
2.) Snow White (Dis) 4,200 theaters, Fri $3.7M (-77%), 3-day $14.2M (-66%), Total $66.3M/Wk 2
3.) The Chosen – Last Supper – Part 1 (Fath) 2,235 theaters, Fri $5.1M Sat $3.5M Sun $2.8M 3-day $11.49M/Wk 1
4.) Woman in the Yard (Uni) 2,842 theaters, Fri $3.6M Sat $3.5M Sun $2.2M 3-day $9.45M/Wk 1
5.) Death of a Unicorn (A24) 3,050 theaters Fri $2.2M Sat $2M Sun $1.4M 3-day $5.8M/Wk 1
6.) Princess Mononoke(GKIDS) 330 theaters, Fri $2M, Sat $1M Sun $920K 3-day $4M/Wk 1 (re)
7.) Captain American…(Dis) 2,380 (-520) theaters, Fri $730K (-35%) Sat $1.3M Sun $770K 3-day $2.8M (-30%), Total $196.55M/Wk 7
8.) Black Bag (Foc) 2,065 (-648) theaters, Fri $620K (-50%) Sat $960K Sun $570K 3-day $2.15M (-50%), Total $18.7M/Wk 3
9.) Mickey 17 (WB) 1,648 (-936) theaters, Fri $560K (-47%) Sat $825K Sun $535K 3-day $1.92M (-48%) Total $43.5M/Wk 4
10.) Novocaine (Par) 2,273 (-1,096) theatees, Fri $415K (-62%) Sat $630K Sun $405K 3-day $1.45M (-61%), Total $18.7M/Wk 3
Notables:
Alto Knights (WB) 2,651 theaters, Fri $300K Sat $470K Sun $330K, 3-day $1.1M (-65%), Total $5.5M/Wk 2