Tranny Tackles the Cinema: The Films of 4/14

[transformers2]

Universal has to be mighty happy that they got into business with Nintendo.

The Super Mario Bros. Movie earned a lot of gold coins in its first 6 days of release, which led to the falling of some long-held records. Its $146.3 mil debut marked the best ever OW for an Illumination movie, surpassing Despicable Me 2 as well as the best opening for any animated movie since Incredibles 2 in June 2018 and its $204.4 5-day holiday weekend opening topped Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen's July 4 bow in 2009 for the best in history., And with its just reported $20.1 mil yesterday, it set a new Monday high for an Illumination movie, passing Sing. With roughly $224.5 mil already in the bank and no new family films coming out until The Little Mermaid on Memorial Day weekend, Mario, Lugi, Peach and the rest of the Mario gang are going to be sitting pretty atop the box office for quite some time. The amount of sequels and spin-offs that are going to come from this thing is going to be massive and if Kirby's Air Ride and Lugi's Mansion aren't among them, Universal will be hearing from my legal team.

Mario wasn't the only new wide opener that got off to a great start. Air marked a successful return to the theatrical space for Amazon Studios as the Michael Jordan Nike biopic banked $14.5 mil over the 3-day weekend and $20.2 mil since Wednesday. Given the crowdpleasing nature of the story and strong exit polling/reviews its received, Ben Affleck's latest directorial effort could rip off a real nice multiplier and bank $60+ mil when its all said and done. No word on what the next title Amazon intends to put in theaters, but after Air's hot start, we should get an answer sometime soon

While there was no record-breaking performances or successful theatrical returns to speak of, there was still plenty to celebrate on the limited front. Last year's official Best International Feature Selection from Pakistan Joyland earned a great $20,638 at NYC's Film Forum, Kelly Reichardt and Michelle Williams' latest collaboration Showing Up made a solid $66,932 from 4 NYC/LA theaters and Neon's eco-thriller How to Blow Up a Pipline earned just under $10k per screen from 12 theaters. With Beau is Afraid rolling into a small number of theaters this weekend, expect another much-needed busy week on the specialty circuit .

Really the only losers this weekend were the holdovers. Dungeons and Dragons: Honor Among Thieves confirmed that it will indeed be a frontloaded film with a $13.9 mil sophomore frame (a pretty step drop of 63%)-which pretty much thwarts whatever sequel hopes that it had, John Wick: Chapter 4 eased another 49% ($14.5 mil) in its third weekend of release and Shazam!: Fury of the Gods confirmed it won't even able to hit $60 mil domestic as it earned only $1.5 mil over the Easter weekend (another 60%+ drop). The sole exception was Scream VI-which was the only holdover in the top 10 to enjoy a sub 40% drop. It banked $ 3.4 mil and officially crossed the $100 mil mark-making it the first Scream film to do since the second installment back in 1997. With news breaking today that Radio Silence is making a mystery monster film for Universal next, they'll either be departing the franchise or the wait for Scream 7 will be a little longer than expected.

Wide Releases:
It's pretty amusing that the colossal failure of Tom Cruise's “The Mummy” and the “Dark Universe” it was supposed to help launch caused Universal to completely re-imagine how their classic monsters would be utilized moving forward. Renfield (Universal)-which is the first of the two radically different spins on Dracula they have on their release calendar this year (the long-delayed The Last Voyage of the Demeter is currently slated for August)-is a particularly brazen departure. The action comedy horror frames the story of Dracula through his long-suffering familiar Renfield (played by Nicholas Hoult)-who has grown tired of serving the bloodsucker (Nicolas Cage) after hundreds of years and after he falls for a traffic cop (Awkwafina), officially seeks to end his arrangement with the Count. Obviously, Renfield's wishes are not honored by Dracula and soon, Renfield and his lady friend have to stand up and fight against Dracula and his new friends in the New Orleans Mob (led by Ben Schwartz and Shohreh Aghdashloo) if they want to remain alive and/or human.

Just like Cocaine Bear and Violent Night in recent months, Renfield looks like another R-rated genre movie meets comedy winner for Universal. They've done a really good of establishing the film's unique toxic relationship/genre-bending hook, there's palpable excitement to see how Cage goes about portraying Dracula and unlike the aforementioned films, the early reviews have been pretty strong. The only downside is Renfield is entering a very crowded adult genre marketplace that is set to get even more competitive next weekend when Evil Dead Rise and The Covenant open, which could damper its ability to reach the $50 mil threshold of Violent Night or the $65 mil threshold of Cocaine Bear.
Price: $13 ULT/$12 BO
Predictions: $12-20 mil OW/2-5 PTA /5-9 Top 5/mid to high 6 IMDB/$35-65 mil total BO
Worth Putting on Your Slate?: Legs could be an issue that drag down its value a bit, but it should be a respectable-to-solid option in either format.


Have you every wondered if The Pope had an official exorcist? If so, it's your lucky day because it turns out that he does. The Pope's Exorcist (Sony/Screen Gems) is allegedly ripped straight from the case files of Father Gabriele Amorth-who was the lead exorcist of the Diocese of Rome from 1986 through 2000 and regularly hired by the Vatican to handle all things potential demonic possession. In the film, Russell Crowe-who appears to have turned in his House of Gucci audition 2 years too late-plays Amorth as he is brought into deal with a particularly nasty case involving the possession of a young boy (Peter DeSouza-Feighoney).

As bullish as everyone around Hollywood is about horror at the moment, that excitement just doesn't really apply here. The Pope's Exorcist looks like another generic possession movie that not only doesn't do anything new with the genre, but doesn't even execute the formula well. Based on the tracking numbers, the nondescript reviews from the foreign markets where it released this past weekend and the lack of chatter surrounding it 48 hours ahead of its release, audiences seem to agree and will most likely either go see Renfield instead or avoid the theater entirely until Evil Dead Rise comes out next week. Despite all of this cynicism, it does have a realistic chance of topping last year's Prey for the Devil-which finished its run with $19.8 mil and topping its current mid single-digit tracking number.
Price: $8 ULT/$9 BO
Predictions: $4-11 mil OW/0-1 PTA/0-2 Top 5/high 5 to low 6 IMDB/$13-35 mil total BO
Worth Putting on Your Slate?: Hell no.


Toni Collette's post- Hereditary decompression tour continues with perhaps its most easygoing stop yet in Mafia Mamma (Bleecker Street). The comedy project from Catherine Hardwicke of all people is centered around an Italian-American woman who is summoned to Italy after the death of her estranged grandfather (Alessandro Bressanello), only to discover that her family is in the mob and her late grandfather wants her to become the new don. Mamma mia, what a dilemma!!!

If another distributor other than Bleecker Street was behind this, it might've had a shot of being a sleeper hit. Its goofy fish-out-of-water premise mixed with broad comedy and the bloody action of an R-rated mob movie has some real crowdpleasing potential. But alas, that's not the case and the film appears to be track for nothing more than a $5-10 million BO run before it slips into obscurity for the rest of the time.
Price: $4 ULT/$3 BO
Predictions: $1.5-4 mil OW/0 PTA or Top 5 (2 weeks)/low to mid 5 IMDB/$3-10 mil total BO
Worth Putting on Your Slate?: No.


Nat Clifton's story deserved better than this. Sweetwater (Briarcliff) looks like if somebody only had about $500,000 to make a basketball movie. Everything from the cast they assembled (Jeremy Piven, Richard Dreyfuss, Robert Ri'chard, basically everybody else besides Carey Elwes and Kevin Pollak-who are the only members of the cast that have appeared in legit Holllywood projects in the past few years) to the visual style to the way the basketball scenes were filmed reeks of something that was being filmed just for the sake of being filmed. The director has been trying to make this movie for 20 years and honestly he should've waited 20 more if this was this was the best he could do with an inherently compelling underdog narrative about a man who made the jump from the Harlem Globetrotters to the NBA where he was one of the first black players to ever play in the league and later become the oldest first time All-Star selection in league history up to that point when he made the Eastern Conference team at the age of 34.

In terms of usefulness for our game, there's none whatsoever. With Briarcliff putting it out, Sweetwater will quietly get dumped into 1,500 or so theaters as they've already made their money selling the rights to release it in Serbia and be completely done with its run by the end of the month, if not sooner. If this doesn't prove to be the worst low money wide release pick of the season, I'll be outright shocked.
Price: $3 ULT/$2 BO
Predictions: $800k-3 mil OW/0 PTA or Top 5 /high 5 to low 6 IMDb/$2-6 mil total BO
Worth Putting on Your Slate?: Not at all.


Suzume (Sony/Crunchyroll) isn't in the game, but it should be at least somewhat of a factor at the box office this weekend. Reviews for Makoto Shinaki's latest have been excellent, it's stealing some IMAX screens from Super Mario Bros. and mirroring the recent anime projects from Japan, opening night presales are strong. While it likely won't get up to the levels of Dragon Ball Z Super: Super Hero or Demon Slayer-The Movie: Mugen Train, a top 5 finish seams feasible.

Limited Releases:
Ari Aster has the honorable distinction of making 2 of the 5 highest grossing movies in A24's history with Hereditary and Midsommar. As a way to honor the success he's brought them, they gave him $35 million-which makes this their most expensive film production yet-to make his bizarro passion project Beau is Afraid (A24). The film that Aster recently described as Jewish Lord of the Rings tells the story of an anxiety-riddled man in his 40's (Joaquin Phoenix) and the nightmarish surreal adventure he goes on as he makes the journey to his mother's (Patti LuPone) house.

As the premise implies, this is a huge departure from Aster's previous work and arguably one of the biggest swings any American filmmaker has taken recently. Naturally given the inherent weirdness of its story and the epic just under 3 hour running time, the reviews haven't been quite as glowing as Aster's previous films. Still, Aster has earned enough goodwill from diehard movie fans at this point that A24 shouldn't be worried about just how enthusiastic the reviews are. The numbers from NYC/LA this weekend should be terrific and there will almost certainly be a vocal group of people talking about how Aster made another gem on every relevant forum for movie discourse this weekend.

How it translates to the nationwide audience once it expands next weekend will be interesting to watch, especially with the added wattage of IMAX screens, but it feels like a pretty safe bet that it's going to have hard time building a sustained run once mainstream audiences get a load of what trippy/chaotic hellscapes Aster cooked up.
Price: $5 ULT/$3 BO
Predictions: $125-300k OW/4-7 PTA/0-3 Top 5/low to mid 7 IMDb/$10-30 mil total BO
Worth Putting on Your Slate: While not without risk, it should end up being a solid enough pick in either format.


After a 1-column absence, the fan favorite “IFC Day and Date Movie of the Week” segment has returned!!!. This week we have Rare Objects (IFC)-the third directorial effort from Katie Holmes. In the drama, Julia Maygora plays a 20-something New York woman fresh out of a stay in a mental hospital who tries to rebuild her life after getting a sales associate job at an antique shop. Alan Cumming, Derek Luke, Saundra Santiago and Holmes round out the cast. If the PTA clears $95 dollars for the weekend, it will be a great success. And that's a wrap on this edition of “IFC Day and Date Movie of the Week”. See you next time folks.
Price: $2 ULT/$1 BO
Predictions: $10-30k OW/0 PTA or top 5/low to mid 6 IMDB/$30-60k total BO
Worth Putting on Your Slate?: No



Weekend Predictions:
1.The Super Mario Bros. Movie $85 mil
2.Renfield $16 mil
3.Air $10 mil
4.John Wick: Chapter 4 $9 mil
5.Suzume $8 mil

-The Pope's Exorcist $6 mil
-Mafia Mamma $3 mil
-Sweetwater $1 mil

PTA: Beau is Afraid, The Super Mario Bros Movie, Renfield, Joyland, Showing Up

Tune in next week when Screen breaks down another busy spring weekend that includes the Necronomicon's first trip to the big city, Guy Ritchie's second movie of the year and the latest entry in the always delightful “French historical drama where everybody speaks English and makes no effort to sound even remotely French” genre.

[Buscemi2]

It's looking like Sweetwater will only be getting the select markets treatment but I expect audiences will avoid in droves. It's from the director of that 9/11 movie with Charlie Sheen from some years back so I'm sure it's of extremely low quality. But somehow, it probably won't be the week's worst reviewed film, as the directors of Unplanned have a pro-death penalty movie opening called Nefarious, with the other guy from The Boondock Saints and a demon living inside of him. It seems like a few chains got this one to be semi-wide instead of being your run-of-the-mill Daily Wire title.

I'm amazed Mafia Mamma is playing wide. There's been almost no marketing and I don't expect anything above disposable with it. I wouldn't expect any box office but it likely breaks even with the money the distributor is getting from Showtime for pay cable rights from titles like this one.

[numbersix]

I think Renfield is going to get closer to 10m this weekend. You can only have so many hits happening at any one moment, and Nic Cage may be loved, but he's not a box office draw (see his Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent). This could sink.

Beau is Afraid's reviews are not great, and an oddity like this needs some love. With no fests playing it expect it to hit the lower end of your prodictions, closer to $10m.

Going to be interesting to see how Mario holds, but I genuinely think it'll end up as one of the highest earning films of the year. $400m? More???

[Buscemi2]

Renfield's going to suffer from the massive onslaught of horror films out there. This is one of three horror titles opening this week and there is another horror title, plus the expanding Beau is Afraid, next Friday.

Why are we getting so many at once?

[Chienfantome]

With such a bang as a start, Mario can definitely reach $400M. And I agree, I'm thinking Renfield will be closer to 10M than 20M.
Pope's a non starter I think. Suzumeshould bank on the film's stellar reputation, but those kinds of animes don't go very far. but if it can help me get closer to Six in the draft, I'll take it.

[transformers2]

Unless Mario has a 60+% drop this weekend, it shouldn't have any problem clearing $400 mil. It more or less has the next 3 weekends with all the genre/mid-budget movies coming out and the lack of true kids movies coming out until The Little Mermaid should be great for its legs.

[transformers2]

Preview totals:
Renfield $900k
The Pope's Exorcist $850k
Suzume $680k

[numbersix]

That's higher than expected for Pope's Exorcist.

[transformers2]

It is indeed. Sony's $10 mil internal tracking number looks like it could be spot-on.

[Buscemi2]

Exorcism-themed horror films tend to do well.

And the showing of Suzume I went to was reasonably well-attended for a 1:20 pm showtime. It could be frontloaded though as it's anime.

[Buscemi2]

It looks like the horror comedy is back to being for a niche audience. Renfield only got a B- Cinemascore.

[transformers2]

Weekend Estimates:
The Super Mario Bros. Movie $87 mil
The Pope's Exorcist $9.2 mil
John Wick: Chapter 4 $7.9 mil
Renfield $7.8 mil
Air $7.7 mil
Dungeons and Dragons: Honor Among Thieves $7.4 mil
Suzume $5 mil
Mafia Mamma $2 mil
Scream VI $1.5 mil
Nefarious $1.3 mil

-Sweetwater $350k
-Beau is Afraid $321k

PTA:
-Beau is Afraid $81k
-The Super Mario Bros. Movie $19.9k
-Showing Up $4.5k
-The Pope's Exorcist $2.9k
-John Wick: Chapter 4 $2.6k

Beau is Afraid only making $29k less than Sweetwater in exactly 1,200 fewer theaters is nuts.

[Buscemi2]

Beau is Afraid was everywhere and had audience appeal. Sweetwater was a cheap cash-in designed more for on demand and cable.

[Chienfantome]

Great PTA score from Beau is Afraid. It's probably not gonna translate nationwide, but it's great to see such great PTA numbers come back.

[Buscemi2]

Beau is Afraid was shown on both regular and IMAX screens, so it benefited from IMAX surcharges as well as the high ticket prices that are in New York and Los Angeles.

Most of the theatres getting it on Friday will more than likely dump it into a small auditorium while Evil Dead Rise and The Covenant (a film that's had almost no marketing so far) get the bigger auditoriums.

Meanwhile, another example of how badly Sweetwater did: the other basketball movie currently in release, Champions, made $3,000 less this weekend. It is in its sixth weekend and is only currently in 183 theatres. It is also currently available to rent on demand while Sweetwater isn't.