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The latest Spidey adventure, starring Tom
Holland as the title web-slinger, collected a leading $33
million from 4,108 theaters between Friday and Sunday, boosting
its domestic tally to $668 million. After this weekend's haul,
"Spider-Man: No Way Home" stands as the sixth-highest grossing
movie in history at the domestic box office, surpassing
"Titanic" ($659 million) and "Jurassic World" ($652 million). At
this rate, it'll soon take the No. 5 spot, which currently
belongs to "Avengers: Infinity War" ($678 million).
It's no small feat that "Spider-Man: No Way Home" generated $30
million in a single weekend this far into its theatrical run. In
pandemic times, most movies would be lucky to sell that many
tickets in their opening weekend, much less after playing in
theaters for nearly a month -- all while a highly contagious
COVID-19 variant continues to rapidly spread. But, as this
weekend illustrates, audiences aren't willing to leave the house
and visit their local multiplex for just any movie.
Universal's star-studded action spy film "The 355" had to learn
that the hard way. The film managed to fall short of already low
expectations, generating a dismal $4.8 million from 3,145 North
American venues over the weekend. The bad news? It's unlikely to
rebound in its theatrical run since "The 355" has garnered
mostly negative reviews (it holds a bleak 27% on Rotten
Tomatoes). The good news? The film, which cost $40 million to
produce, will likely move to digital rental platforms in 17
days, and it will play on the streaming service Peacock in 45
days, which could attempt to mitigate theatrical losses.
Directed by Simon Kinberg and co-starring Diane Kruger and Fan
Bingbing, "The 355" follows international spies who form an
unlikely team in order to put an end to potentially world-ending
events. In Variety's review, chief film critic Owen Gleiberman
called it "generic, over-the-top, and 20 minutes too long, kind
of like a Netflix movie." Moviegoers were kinder, awarding the
film a "B+" CinemaScore.
"The 355" landed in third place on domestic box office charts,
ranking behind "Sing 2," which opened in theaters around
Christmas. The animated musical comedy, also from Universal
Pictures, added $11.9 million from 3,713 cinemas over the
weekend, pushing its North American total to $100 million. It's
the first animated film to cross the $100 million mark since
Disney's "Frozen II" in 2019.
That's a notable achievement at a time when parents haven't been
taking their young kids to the movies, though box office
analysts remain concerned about the sluggish return of family
audiences. In 2019, animated films generated more money than any
other genre, thanks to family friendly hits like "The Lion King"
($543 million), "Toy Story 4" ($434 million), "Frozen II" ($430
million), and "Aladdin" ($335 million). There hasn't been a
single pandemic-era film geared toward kids that has been able
to come close to reaching similar heights. So it has been
worrying to film operators that Disney has already nixed plans
to release Pixar's "Turning Red" in theaters. Instead, it will
debut on Disney Plus in March.
"The industry needs the family audience back in force for a
sustained recovery," says David A. Gross, who runs the movie
consulting firm Franchise Entertainment Research.
In fourth place, Disney and 20th Century's "The King's Man"
brought in $3.3 million from 3,040 venues. So far, the prequel
in "The Kingsman" action franchise has made $25 million at the
domestic box office and $49 million internationally.
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