Box Office Discussion: Fine "Dune"

 Dune wins a slow Halloween weekend, as newcomers struggle.

Halloween weekend is always a less-than-ideal time to release a movie, especially when Halloween actually occurs during the weekend.  This year, however, there were four new wide-or-semiwide releases, a major expansion, and a re-release of a classic to promote the upcoming sequel.  And moviegoers pretty much ignored all of them in favor of the tried and true.

Leading the way was Dune, which stayed in first despite a not-great 62% fall from last weekend, to $15.4 million.  Then again, falls like that have been typical for most of Warner's lineup this year, thanks at least in part to the fact that every title is available to stream on HBO Max.  Still, the space desert epic has managed to take in a solid $69.3 million after ten days, which pushes it past The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It and just below Space Jam: A New Legacy among WB's 2021 titles.  It is still most likely on track to hit $100 million, which will likely be enough for it to pass Godzilla vs. Kong to become the studio's top film of the year, at least for now.

After a huge drop last weekend, Halloween Kills had a relatively small drop on its titular weekend, coming in with $8.7 million.  It has now grossed $85.9 million.  With Halloween (the holiday) now in the past, it remains to be seen if the film can earn the $14.1 million in November to break the $100 million mark. With no wide-release horror films set for release until the new Resident Evil Thanksgiving weekend, the film could end up being the month's default horror option, which should help it reach the century mark.

Bond, James Bond continues to perform well, as No Time to Die has time to pick up another $007.8 million, for a total of $133.4 million.  It looks to be heading to a final around $150 million, give or take.

Opening in fourth was the anime TV spin-off My Hero Academia: World Heroes Mission with $6.4 million.  The third movie in the film franchise, it has already outgrossed the domestic run of the first film in 2018, and has a good shot at passing the gross of the second, which was largely cut off by the pandemic.

In fifth was Venom: Let There Be Carnage, which took in $5.8 million, enough to finally push it past Black Widow to become the second-highest-grossing film of the year so far, with $190.4 million.  It should pass $200 million by Thanksgiving.

Opening in sixth was Antlers, which felt like a little-advertised dump despite decent reviews, a good cast including Keri Russell and Jessie Plemons, and a well-regarded director in Scott Cooper.  The horror film opened to $4.3 million, and will likely fade fast.

It at least did better than the much more hyped Last Night in Soho, which could only manage $4.2 million.  That thriller got pretty good reviews (better than the ones gotten by Antlers, in fact), but probably needed outstanding reviews to truly break through.  Both films have good chances of becoming cult hits once they make their way to a streaming service.

Ron's Gone Wrong continues to go wrong at the box office, as the animated title could only pull down $3.7 million for a ten-day total of $12.6 million and hope for rediscovery eventually on Disney+.  In ninth, The Addams Family 2 broke the $50 million barrier, taking in $3.1 million for a total of $52.7 million.

In tenth, The French Dispatch wasn't quite able to double its take from last weekend, despite now playing in over 700 theaters.  It earned $2.6 million, meaning it won't be crossing over to become a mainstream success like The Grand Budapest Hotel and Moonrise Kingdom.  Indeed, it might end up below the final gross of The Darjeeling Limited, which outside of his first film, the barely released Bottle Rocket, is Wes Anderson's current lowest grosser.  Dispatch's ten-day total is $4.8 million.

Outside the Top 10, a re-release of Ghostbusters, to promote the upcoming Ghostbusters: Afterlife, attracted little interest, opening to $0.3 million.  That's still better than the new drama A Mouthful of Air could muster up, earning a mere $0.1 million despite playing on over 800 screens.

As the holiday movie season kicks off this weekend, likely heading for a #1 opening is Eternals, the latest MCU entry, in which the likes of Angelina Jolie, Salma Hayek, and Kumail Nanjiani as immortal creatures who watch over our planet but never interfere with humans--at least until now.  A month ago, this one seemed on track for a possible $100 million opening, the first of the pandemic era.  However, reviews haven't been great, which might dampen the turnout.  It should still dominate this weekend, though.  A possible #2 could be Spencer, a Princess Diana biopic (if you haven't gotten enough of her from The Crown and the upcoming Broadway musical streaming on Netflix).  Kristen Stewart is getting Oscar buzz for her work, but we'll see if she can bring in the audience.  Also screening in limited release is Red Notice, an action comedy starring Dwayne Johnson, Ryan Reynolds, and Gal Gadot, that ten years ago would have been one of the most anticipated titles of the holidays.  Now, it's getting seen in a few theaters before its Netflix debut next week.  Will Eternals be able to surprise and hit the century mark?  We'll find out next week.