In shock, expected winner of the weekend Wolfman was shelved for Sony Pictures’ female-led comedy One of these days. A Girls trip-style sleeper hit that our prediction panel didn’t see coming as it was initially valued at $8-10 million, but it came in at #1 for the 3-day derby with an estimated $11.6 million of dollars, within a hair of this one. MoufasaThat’s $11.53 million. The per-screen average was $4,336 across 2,675 screens, 679 screens less than Wolfman.
The comedy starring Keke Palmer and SZA has drawn many comparisons to Girls tripwhich opened in a prime summer 2017 slot to $31.2 million before going on to gross $115.1 million domestically. It is not surprising that the female audience gives One of these days a PostTrak rating of 93% on PostTrak, while women under 25 give it 97%.
This is what the 4 days looked like…
Audience reactions have been so positive that some are speculating that Sony will be leaving money on the table if it doesn’t step up its marketing game on this film. Rotten Tomatoes has a 97% critical rating from 92% audience (better than Girls Trip’s 91%/78%), with an “A-” CinemaScore and overall PostTrak ratings of 84% positive and 63% recommend definitive.
Disney Mufasa: The Lion King triumphed once again. Because the totals for all 3 days are so close between Mufasa and One of Them Days ($11.6 million to $11.53 million), we may have to wait for Monday’s actual numbers to officially call it for either movie, but the 4-day MLK weekend belongs to the lion pack. With $15.5 million, Barry Jenkins’ film once again outperformed, losing only -19% from the last frame.
This is what the 3 days looked like…
That puts the film above the $200 million domestic benchmark, at $205.8 million, and with $588 million worldwide, it tops Godzilla x Kong: The New Kingdom ($572 million) to become the 7th worldwide release in 2024. Overseas, it remains the first non-local film in major territories like France, Germany, Spain, Brazil, Mexico and ‘Latin America. The highest-earning territories are France ($35.9 million), the United Kingdom ($32.6 million) and Mexico ($26.8 million).
Universal and Blumhouse’s attempt to replicate the success of their 2020 monster hit The invisible man didn’t so much roar as groan as writer/director Leigh Whannell’s Wolf Man largely disappointed with just $10.55 million for 3 days and $12 million for 4 days to take third place. About 41% of ticket sales were through IMAX and Premium Large Formats, although IMAX only grossed $1.55 million domestically on that title, and $2 million total nationwide worldwide.
For comparison, Mike Nichols’ 1994 revisionist werewolf drama. Wolf with Jack Nicholson opened to $17.9 million…and that was three decades ago, unadjusted. It’s not even close to Universal’s 2010 duds The Wolf Man which opened to $31.4 million. The new Wolfman Costs a fraction of the Benicio del Toro version, but looks like DOA.
Here’s what the estimated 4-day holiday weekend for the monster movie currently looks like…
So what happened? Well, the movie itself happened. Rotten Tomatoes’ critical (53%) and audience (59%) scores are pretty much in line with the fact that Whannell’s new film didn’t deliver the goods. CinemaScore was a “C-“, which is low even for a horror film. To compare, The invisible man got a “B+” and an RT of 91% critic/88% audience. PostTrak was a scary 54% positive and 34% definite recommend, with a majority male audience at 60% despite lead Julia Garner at the forefront. The largest age group was 25-34 year olds (38%), followed by 18-24 year olds (24%), with the horror genre itself being the biggest draw, as was the case for Nosferatu.
Here’s what the demographics looked like…
Internationally Wolfman had even less bite, grossing $4.83 million from 53 markets, including the United Kingdom and Ireland ($831,000), France ($508,000), Spain ($366,000) and ‘Italy ($270,000) for a worldwide estimate of $15.38 million. It’s hard to overstate what a disappointment this is, debuting below the January 2024 Blumhouse title. Night swimming ($11.7 million). With the same team behind The invisible man and the 81-year mark of Universal’s Wolf Man IP, this should have been a gift. Unfortunately, the film had no hook beyond a boilerplate story of family survival, and poor word of mouth killed the momentum. It’s possible that the studio took too long to capitalize The invisible manIt’s a success, but it’s hard to argue for a lack of interest in classic monster resurrections given the success of Nosferatu ($89.4 million domestic/$155.6 million globally).
More good news for the House of Mouse, Disney’s Moana 2 officially crossed the $1 billion mark globally with $1.009 billion. Domestically, it stands at $442.79 million in total, making it the second-largest all-time revenue earner in the United States for Walt Disney Animation behind Frozen II ($477.3 million). Not bad for a movie that was almost a streaming show.
| Title | Weekend estimate | % Change | Locations | Change of location | Public Service Announcement | National total | Week | Distributer |
| One of these days | $11,600,000 | 2,675 | $4,336 | $11,600,000 | 1 | Sony Photos | ||
| Mufasa: The Lion King | $11,530,000 | -19% | 3,555 | -65 | $3,243 | $205,828,338 | 5 | Walt Disney |
| Wolfman | $10,550,000 | 3,354 | $3,145 | $10,550,000 | 1 | Universal | ||
| Sonic the Hedgehog 3 | $8,600,000 | -24% | 3,306 | -276 | $2,601 | $216,498,000 | 5 | Paramount P… |
| Den of Thieves 2: Pantera | $6,600,000 | -56% | 3,008 | North Carolina | $2,194 | $26,175,028 | 2 | Lions Gate |
| Moana 2 | $6,068,000 | -7% | 2,825 | -345 | $2,148 | $442,798,932 | 8 | Walt Disney |
| Nosferatu | $4,300,000 | -38% | 2,545 | -537 | $1,690 | $89,401,000 | 4 | Focus Features |
| A complete stranger | $3,796,000 | -26% | 2,500 | -315 | $1,518 | $57,575,001 | 4 | Projector… |
| Wicked | $3,550,000 | -31% | 2,352 | -615 | $1,509 | $464,512,000 | 9 | Universal |
| Little girl | $2,021,674 | -34% | 1,460 | -427 | $1,385 | $25,365,389 | 4 | A24 |
| The Brutalist | $1,981,636 | 43% | 338 | 270 | $5,863 | $5,446,904 | 5 | A24 |
| Property | $559,113 | -47% | 1,000 | -500 | $559 | $20,187,125 | 5 | Angel Studios |
| Gladiator II | $500,000 | -59% | 614 | -715 | $814 | $172,018,000 | 9 | Paramount P… |
| September 5 | $365,000 | 506% | 121 | 101 | $3,017 | $776,000 | 6 | Paramount P… |
| Nickel Boys | $297,000 | 148% | 240 | 214 | $1,238 | $948,782 | 6 | Amazon MGM S… |
| To flow | $275,500 | -10% | 325 | 78 | $848 | $3,419,811 | 9 | Janus Films |
| The wild robot | $266,000 | +1,142 | 1,076 | 972 | $247 | $143,534,000 | 17 | Universal |
| better man | $255,000 | -76% | 1,290 | -1 | $198 | $1,806,000 | 4 | Paramount P… |
| Sing Sing | $239,533 | 560 | $428 | $3,018,278 | 28 | A24 | ||
| Anora | $183,000 | 88% | 536 | 425 | $341 | $14,803,104 | 14 | Neon |
| Hard truths | $153,197 | -11% | 121 | 99 | $1,266 | $383,151 | 7 | Bleecker Street |
| Conclave | $144,000 | 113% | 542 | 474 | $266 | $31,694,000 | 13 | Focus Features |
| Autumn and the Black Jaguar | $121,000 | 605 | $200 | $121,000 | 1 | Blue Fox Ent… | ||
| Kraven the Hunter | $106,000 | -71% | 376 | -628 | $282 | $24,717,000 | 6 | Sony Photos |
| A real pain | $64,000 | -39% | 55 | -15 | $1,164 | $8,135,800 | 12 | Projector… |
| Everything we imagine as light | $47,100 | -14% | 34 | -17 | $1,385 | $919,591 | 10 | Janus Films |
| The seed of the sacred fig | $35,650 | -15% | 20 | 1 | $1,783 | $429,751 | 8 | Neon |
| Vermilion | $20,900 | -33% | 11 | -8 | $1,900 | $110,412 | 4 | Janus Films |
| Soundtrack of a coup d’état | $13,620 | -5% | 9 | -3 | $1,513 | $222,707 | 12 | Lorber Cinema |
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