After a month at the top, “Spider-Man: No Way Home” has unexpectedly been beaten at the box office. According to studio estimates released Sunday, the “Scream” reboot opened with $30.6 million in weekend ticket sales.
Over the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday weekend, “Scream,” a self-described “requel” that is both the fifth picture in the franchise and a remake with a new, younger cast, dominated all releases. It is expected to generate $35 million, including Monday’s grosses, according to Paramount. “Scream,” which cost $24 million to create, grossed an additional $18 million in 50 foreign markets.
This resulted in a strong reboot for the self-aware slasher franchise. The rights to the “Scream” films, which were previously a steady source of revenue for Harvey and Bob Weinstein’s Miramax Films, were purchased by Spyglass Media Group, which co-produced the new film with Paramount. The first “Scream” not directed by Wes Craven, who died in 2015, was directed by Matt Bettinello-Olpin and Tyler Gillett. It stars Neve Campbell, Courteney Cox, and David Arquette from the original “Scream” cast, as well as Melissa Barrera, Jenna Ortega, and Jack Quaid.
Most notably, “Scream” is the first box-office hit in a year in which Hollywood is hoping for a return to weekly movie theater stability. January is usually a slow month at the box office, but the emergence of the omicron type in COVID-19 has thrown some winter film releases into trouble.
“All of our traditional measures were indicating a solid opening, but as I kept telling people: We’re still in this thing and it’s very difficult to determine what will actually happen,” says Chris Aronson, distribution chief for Paramount. “Now we’re open, people have seen the movie and we’re off and running. Hopefully this becomes another building block toward building the business back and getting it back to some semblance of normalcy.”
Meanwhile, “Spider-Man: No Way Home” fell to second place in the box office but continued to climb the charts.
In its fifth weekend of release, “No Way Home” brought in $20.8 million. With another $5.2 million on Martin Luther King Jr. Day, Sony Pictures forecasts “No Way Home” will surpass “Black Panther” and move into fourth place all-time with a domestic cumulative total of $703.9 million on Monday. Only “Avatar” ($760 million), “Avengers: Endgame” ($858 million), and “Star Wars: The Force Awakens” ($936 million) have made more money. “No Way Home” has made $1.6 billion worldwide.
“Sing 2,” from Universal Pictures, came in third place in its fourth weekend, with $8.3 million over three days. The animated sequel has grossed $122.1 million in the United States and $96.3 million abroad.
While Paramount may have celebrated “Scream’s” premiere by deferring most of its top 2021 films to 2022 (including “Top Gun: Maverick” and “Mission Impossible 7”), the film’s performance exemplified contemporary box-office reality. Younger-targeted superhero and genre films have recovered to near-pre-pandemic levels, whereas older-targeted films have not.
“Scream” performed better than the previous installment, “Scream 4,” which garnered mostly positive reviews (81 percent fresh on Rotten Tomatoes) and a B+ CinemaScore from viewers. That picture made $19.3 million at the box office. According to Sony, 42 percent of the audience for the new “Scream” was under the age of 25. However, any success requires a diverse audience, and “Scream” drew in fans of the early franchise instalments as well. Over 33 percent of ticket buyers were over the age of 35.
“Belle,” Mamoru Hosoda’s critically praised anime spin on “Beauty and the Beast,” was the only other widely distributed film over the weekend. It had a $1.6 million opening weekend in 1,326 theaters.
According to Comscore, estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday in U.S. and Canadian theaters.
1. “Scream,” $30.6 million.
2. “Spider-Man: No Way Home,” $20.8 million.
3. “Sing 2,” $8.3 million.
4. “The 355,” $2.3 million.
5. “The King’s Man,” $2.3 million.
6. “Beautiful,” $1.6 million.
7. “American Underdog,” $1.6 million.
8. “West Side Story,” $948,000.
9. “Licorice Pizza,” $880,000.
10. “The Matrix Resurrections,” $815,000.
Image Credit: Getty
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