Two new release and two expansions are fighting for consideration this Thanksgiving. Devotion and Strange World are new while Bones and All and The Fabelmans are expanding. You can probably set aside Bones and All and Devotion. Neither film has the crossover carry potential to take the top spot at the box office. Strange World has the Disney label while Fabelmans has Spielberg. That said, Strange World has more broad appeal than Fabelmans since the latter isn’t really an action-adventure or family-adventure film like much of what used to make the most money for Spielberg.
Our Highest Rated Films: Strange World
Our Best Awards Ratings: Strange World (Oscars)
OTHER LIMITED RELEASES
Bones and All (Expands Wide)
The Fabelmans (Expands Wide)
All The Beauty And The Bloodshed (Limited)
Battle For Saipan (Limited)
Freedom on Fire: Ukraine’s Fight for Freedom (Limited)
Leonor Will Never Die (Limited)
The Son (Limited)
While it would be impossible for anything but Black Panther: Wakanda Forever to top the box office this weekend, of the two new releases, neither really seems like a dominant type of film, so I suspect that The Menu may end up on top of the two.
There’s only one new wide release this weekend and that’s because there is no film that could successfully compete with it. Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, a sequel to the $700+ million dollar blockbuster Black Panther, is sure to dominate the box office for the next few weeks until the Avatar releases in December. That’s quite a bit of time, though, so whether it can stay at the top of the box office all those intervening weeks, I don’t know. Suffice it to say, reigning 3-week champion Black Adam will hand over its crown to the latest Marvel Cinematic Universe entry.
We have one new wide release, One Piece Film: Red, and one expanding feature, Armageddon Time. Neither is likely to outperform the third weekend of Black Adam, so we’ll see.
This week’s wide releases are more horror fodder for audiences, but won’t provide an incredibly strong weekend as a result. Prey for the Devil may struggle to overcome the second week of Black Adam, but as the only new wide release, it will have those who’ve seen those prior films as an available choice.
From the soft debut of Halloween Ends to the likely stellar debut of Black Adam what a difference a week can make. Black Adam faces only minor competition from Julia Roberts and George Clooney whose romantic comedy Ticket to Paradise faces unknown circumstances.
With Smile trying for a third week at the top of the box office chart, its chances are slim with the literally ultimate Halloween film, Halloween Ends, releasing. Jamie Lee Curtis’ final outing as Laurie Strode should do well at the box office and handily top the chart.
With two new wide releases, both coming on the heels of the success of Smile, the weekend’s top spot is up for grabs. Likely to come in first is kids book adaptation Lyle, Lyle, Crocodile with original music by The Greatest Showman composers Benj Pasek and Justin Paul and sung by Shawn Mendes. The film has all the earmarks for a solid box office performer, while its competition does not. David O. Russell has made some popular films, but his most popular ones were major Oscar players and Amsterdam is not that, so I don’t expect it to do much business.
Two new wide releases will compete for the top of the box office against the second weekend of Don’t Worry, Darling and The Woman King. The Woman King didn’t have the best second-weekend hold, so it’s not likely to compete, but new releases Bros and Smile do have that opportunity. We don’t know how a gay rom com is going to play at the box office as we don’t have any precedents to look at. Smile, on the other hand, is playing towards the Halloween crowd and will likely do well because of that.
There’s one new wide release, one expanding feature, and one re-release headed to the box office this weekend and while the re-release of Avatar is likely to top the charts, Don’t Worry, Darling being the only new wide release is likely to come in above Moonage Daydream, a documentary about David Bowie.
A whole herd of new releases stamped this weekend’s box office. Currently, there are four new wide releases and one expansion headed for cineplexes. While it’s possible a couple of those might end up with more limited releases, of the ones we know for certain will stay wide (Clerks III, which is expanding; See How They Run and The Woman King), Viola Davis’ film has the strongest hand to play. That said, if Pearl goes wide, it could be a surprise hit since inventive horror sometimes does quite well.
The prospects for this weekend’s box office are not particularly great. Three new wide releases hope to break through the morass of old releases in hopes of finding an audience. Horror, Bollywood, and period dramas are on top and none of them look terribly promising. Barbarian likely has the best chance, an average horror film that piques an interest that often does moderately well with audiences. Bollywood hasn’t had as much success, so Brahmastra isn’t likely to come out on top. Then there’s Medieval. Without a major name to pull audiences to the theater, don’t expect it to do terribly well.
There’s only one new wide release this weekend and after the anemia of the prior frame, Honk for Jesus. Save Your Soul. has a clear path towards victory. That is if it can overcome the re-release of Jaws and Spider-Man: No Way Home. It’s Labor Day weekend, so the likelihood of any film doing really well is low.
With two new wide releases, neither with the best prospects at huge openings, Three Thousand Years of Longing seems the better bet to win out over The Invitation and that could also mean the top spot at the weekend box office.
There aren’t a lot of options this weekend for huge openings, so between Beast and Dragon Ball Super: Super Hero, Beast seems the more likely to top the other, but neither are compelling box office contenders.