The month of November is now upon us! Hope everyone had a happy Halloween and a lovely October. In regards to the box office success of the month, after a very successful second half of the summer and a September that was the highest in the post-COVID era, October was… not able to maintain that success. I mentioned in my October preview that the month was bookended by two big comic book films that, on paper, were both expected to do really well. At one point in their pre-release cycles, both were projected as $100 million openers at point. The story is that both of them failed to meet expectations. “Joker: Folie à Deux” failed so badly that, a month into its run, it’s already almost gone from theaters. This upcoming weekend as of me posting this it’ll only be in 72 theaters, with a box office total that’s currently at $58.3 million domestically. Compared to that, “Venom: The Last Dance” is doing significantly better. It’s actually held decently for a comic book film and did well internationally, but it’s $51 million opening is still $40 million less than its predecessor, which opened in October 2021 when COVID was still a big issue. When both your big tentpole releases fail, that’s a bad formula for the month as a whole. “The Wild Robot” ended up as the highest grossing movie of the month and that was a late September release.
November will be better, though. Nothing is a guarantee, of course, but there’s two movies at the end of the month that seem as close to a guarantee as they get, and a couple more that also could do quite well. And yes, we are beginning the second of five weekends this month, so this is again a bit late. But as you’ll see, not much happened in that first weekend, anyways. And this second weekend isn’t expected to do a whole lot better. All these near guaranteed hits I speak of come in the second half of the month as we approach Thanksgiving and the holiday season. So we’ll recap the small releases in weekend one and then preview what the Thanksgiving side of the holiday season has in store!
As always, release date information is courtesy of the-numbers.com and boxofficepro.com. The movies listed are the ones currently scheduled for a wide release in the United States and Canada and are always subject to change.
November 1 – 3
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| Sony's "Here" |
In the first weekend of the month, it was “Venom: The Last Dance” that ruled supreme. After a disappointing opening of $51 million, the lack of any major competition helped it stay at the top with $25.9 million, a drop of just 49 percent. It’s usually rather common for a comic book movie to drop in the 60 percent range, give or take 5 percent either way. “Joker: Folie à Deux” set a lot of bad records with an 81 percent drop in its second weekend just a few weeks ago, so a 49 percent drop for “The Last Dance” is pretty good.
I anticipate that Hollywood studios also anticipated a much bigger opening for “The Last Dance” and decided to avoid the weekend because of that. The biggest new release was Robert Zemeckis’ Here, starring Tom Hanks and Robin Wright, which opened down in 5th place with $4.9 million from 2,647 theaters. The story or the gimmick behind this film is that it’s about one particular plot of land, with the camera essentially in the same spot the whole time. While the time span goes to the very distant past in parts, most of the movie is about the couple living there, which are played by Tom Hanks and Robin Wright, making this a “Forrest Gump” reunion with Zemeckis, Hanks, and Wright. The movie spans the life of this couple from them being a young married couple all the way up to them being an old couple. The movie uses artificial intelligence to de-age the actors in their younger scenes, which might be one of the reasons why many have been turned off by this. I think there’s also many who expect or hope for a return to form at some point from Robert Zemeckis, director of “Back to the Future,” “Who Framed Roger Rabbit,” “Forrest Gump,” and “Cast Away.” But this does not appear to be it. He’s had a long string of disappointments for the last decade plus and this adds to them. In addition to the subpar box office opening, the movie also earned a 36 percent from critics on Rotten Tomatoes and a 57 percent audience score.
There’s two other new wide releases that opened in theaters this week. However, both of them opened below the top 10. Down in 12th place with $1.4 million from 1,500 theaters was the new Liam Neeson movie Absolution. Ever since starring in “Taken,” Liam Neeson has spent most of his time essentially making the same low-budget action movie, which has especially been the case the last five years. Dating back to “Honest Thief” in October 2020, all of them have opened with less than $5 million, but above $1 million, from a moderate amount of theaters. Most of them have had a very similar premise and about the same reaction. And he’s averaged two of them per year. “Absolution” is the latest. An aging mob enforcer attempts to outrun his past and reconnect with his estranged daughter and grandson after discovering he has CTE and only a short time to live. Hey, if Liam Neeson is having fun doing these and he has a specific niche target audience who enjoys watching them, then all is well.
Opening right below that in 13th place with $1.2 million was the animated movie Hitpig! This was released in 2,055 theaters, so the per theater average is a bit uglier. The movie is about a bounty hunter pig who gets hired to capture an elephant, but ends up on a cross-country adventure with said elephant instead. The movie stars the voice talents of Jason Sudeikis, Lilly Singh, RuPaul, Flavor Flav, and Rainn Wilson, which feels like an especially random assortment of actors that were picked out of a hat. The movie comes from Viva Pictures, which has done a few of these low-budget animated films as of late, directed at a young audience. Others include “Rally Road Racers” and “The Amazing Maurice.” They all seem like the type of animated movie that eventually winds up on Netflix and does a good job at distracting the younger kids. Given the box office numbers, clearly a big marketing push for its theatrical release wasn’t a high priority.
Wrapping up the weekend with the moderate releases, two Indian films, “Bhool Bhulaiyaa 3” and “Singham Again” both opened in about 700 theaters each, actually ending up in the bottom half of the top 10, higher than the previous two wide releases mentioned. “Lost on a Mountain in Maine” opened in 630 theaters with $385,442. “The Carpenter” opened in 500 theaters with $137,906. And the biggest limited release was “A Real Pain,” which is directed by Jesse Eisenberg and stars him along with Kieran Culkin from “Succession.” Culkin is getting a lot of Oscar buzz for this role after dominating the Emmys in “Succession.” The movie had the highest per theater average of the week, opening in 4 theaters with $228,856 and will look to expand wide at some point.
November 8 – 10
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| A24's "Heretic" |
“Venom: The Last Dance” is looking to potentially three-peat at the top of the box office this upcoming weekend, but it does have some competition this time around with the latest A24 horror film Heretic, which is looking to give horror fans something to be excited about this weekend as it’s currently at 93 percent from critics on Rotten Tomatoes with 152 reviews counted. In addition to the horror crowd, this seems to have especially captured the attention of people in Utah as the movie is about two sister missionaries who knock on the wrong door and get trapped by a psychopath played by Hugh Grant. Utah crowds, and other LDS church members, have noted the surprising level of accuracy from the trailers in portraying mission life. Prior to the capture, anyways. And both lead actresses were at one point at least members of the Church, so there’s a level of authenticity there that’s unique to Hollywood when portraying missionaries in big studio films. What happens to these sisters after capture is the real mystery here and the main appeal to horror fans. It seems like Hugh Grant’s character will be putting them through a series of psychological “games” or traps that are similar to the “Saw” franchise, although perhaps not as graphic or violent. $8-12 million is the expecting opening range, which has been common for a lot of lower-budget horror films this year, but should be pretty good for A24 standards, which usually opens its films in a smaller number of theaters and expands outwards. But they instead put “Heretic” right into 3,000+ theaters, which is the second time they’ve done that this year, the first being “Civil War,” which opened to $25.5 million. “MaXXXine” was also given an immediate wide release, but in 2,450 theaters and not 3,000+.
For those wanting to get a jump on the Christmas season, the other major wide release this weekend, also opening in 3,000+ theaters, is The Best Christmas Pageant Ever, which comes from Dallas Jenkins, director of “The Chosen,” which he filmed as a side project in between seasons 3 and 4 of “The Chosen.” And while there is some footage from “The Chosen” that Jenkins includes in parts of this movie, this is primarily based on the 1972 novel by Barbara Robinson, which has been adapted into a play as well as a 1983 TV movie. The original novel is about a group of six misfit children from the Herdman family who volunteer to star in their town’s Sunday school Christmas pageant, ending up teaching the town the true meaning of Christmas. This new movie seems to be more or less the same idea, but perhaps in a slightly more modern setting. For a religiously-themed Christmas movie, it has a surprisingly high critics score, currently in the upper 80s, so this appears to be a movie that manages to appeal to a more wide audience of people who in enjoy Christmas rather than just a religious crowd. But that means the target religious audience will probably like it even more. It’s expected to open in the $6-8 million range, although good word of mouth could push it higher. “Heretic” beat it out on Thursday preview totals, so it’s probably looking at a third place finish.
The previous two movies are the only major wide releases, both opening in over 3,000 theaters. But there are a handful of moderate releases also opening. The highest theater count of this tier of releases will be the movie Elevation opening in 1,400 theaters. This movie is a post-apocalyptic action thriller starring Anthony Mackie, Morena Baccarin, and Maddie Hasson who venture from the safety of their home to face monstrous creatures in order to save the life of a child. The advertise it as being from the producers of “A Quiet Place” and “The Purge,” but it’s actually directed by George Nolfi, who worked on neither of those things. He worked as a writer on “Ocean’s Twelve” and “The Bourne Ultimatum,” but the movies he’s directed include “Adjustment Bureau” (2011), “Birth of the Dragon” (2016), and “The Banker” (2020). Early prognostication isn’t looking particularly positive with a Rotten Tomatoes score of 52 percent, but it could be a decent escape for those wanting a simple sci-fi action movie.
Based on the-numbers’ article reporting upcoming theater counts on the weekend, other moderate releases include Small Things Like These opening in 799 theaters, Overlord: The Sacred Kingdom opening in 550 theaters, and Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point opening in 405 theaters. Specific counts for Weekend in Taipei weren’t specifically mentioned in this article, but it seems like it’s also opening somewhere in the realm between “Small Things Like These” and “Elevation.” So that gives plenty of options for those heading out to theaters, wanting some sort of escape or entertainment. “Small Things Like These” comes from Matt Damon and Ben Affleck’s production company and is a historical drama set in the 1980s starring Cillian Murphy about the infamous Magdalene laundries in Ireland. “Weekend in Taipei” is an action thriller were a DEA agent and a former undercover operative revisit their romance, only to learn that doing so leads to dangerous consequences. “Overlord: The Sacred Kingdom” is an anime film that’s an offshoot of the “Overlord” anime series that began as a light novel series and a manga before being adapted into an anime series beginning in 2015 that now has four seasons. And “Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point” provides another option for people wanting to celebrate an early Christmas, a comedy about a chaotic family gathering for what could be the last holiday in their ancestral home.
November 15 – 17
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| Amazon MGM's "Red One" |
The first two weekends of the month provided a large amount of quantity of options. But the last three weekends is where the big releases show up. And that party begins with the Christmas action comedy Red One. And while there could end up a few movies sneaking into moderate release, “Red One” is the only current wide release on the schedule and its projected to launch in over 4,000 theaters. If you’ve been to theaters at any point recently, you’ve probably seen this heavily advertised. The movie stars J.K. Simmons as Santa Claus and he’s been kidnapped. Dwayne Johnson, Chris Evans, and Lucy Liu lead a team of people attempting to go rescue Santa Claus and it appears that a lot of shenanigans ensue in what seems like a somewhat complex holiday world in a movie that seen as the first in an attempted Christmas franchise. Before they get to the franchise part, they’re going to have to make sure this first one is a success. The movie was actually originally scheduled for a debut straight on Amazon Prime in December 2023, but got delayed for a few different reasons, one being the actors strike, and is now being released theatrically by Amazon MGM. This is one of those movies that seems like it has the potential to be a big, fun Christmas blockbuster that is enjoyed by families throughout the season, especially with the cast being led by Dwayne Johnson and Chris Evans. But it’s going to have to survive its initial wave of negative reviews, which have not been nice to the movie at all. But Dwayne Johnson has done big, dumb action movie plenty of times over, so critic reviews might not matter if it manages to connect with family audiences during the season. The most recent tracking by Box Office Pro has it anywhere in the $20-40 million. That means it’ll take the No. 1 spot without any competition, but how high it opens and how well it holds are big wild cards.
November 22 – 24
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| Universal's "Wicked" |
As mentioned, “Red One” is a wild card this month that could be the kick-off of a very lucrative holiday season at the box office. But regardless of how that one does, this weekend is where the real fun begins, with a double feature event that has the potential to be reminiscent of the “Barbenheimer” phenomenon last year, which saw “Barbie” open with $162.0 million, followed by “Oppenheimer” with $82.5 million, both on the July 21, 2023 weekend. “Glicked” isn’t a term that’s had nearly as much usage as “Barbenheimer” and the internet hasn’t completely exploded yet with this showdown, but yes we’re talking about “Wicked” vs. “Gladiator II,” both of which have had a lot of buzz and great early reaction. And both we’ll be released on this weekend, five days before the release of “Moana 2” right before Thanksgiving. Is this going to be an excellent Holy Trinity of holiday movie-going?
Let’s start with the movie that’s going to be the winner on the weekend and that will easily be Wicked. This is a movie and a musical that needs no introduction. It’s currently the fourth longest running Broadway show of all time, behind only “The Phantom of the Opera,” “Chicago” and “The Lion King.” It’s also the second highest grossing Broadway show of all time, behind only “The Lion King.” It’s opening date was October 30, 2003, so it recently passed its 20th anniversary. The show is a loose adaptation of the 1995 novel “Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West,” which in turn was based off of L. Frank Baum’s 1900 novel “The Wonderful Wizard Of Oz.” It is, of course, told from the perspective two witches, Elphaba and Galinda, who eventually become “the good witch” and “the bad witch” in “The Wizard of Oz.” The story explores their complex relationship and Elphaba’s eventual tragic fall when she becomes the Wicked Witch of the West. The movie adaptation has been in the works for quite some time and will finally arrive in theaters, with Cynthia Erivo playing Elphaba and Ariana Grande playing Galinda. The movie is directed by Jon M. Chu, who has quite the varied resumé. That’s included two “Step Up” movies, Justin Bieber’s musical documentary “Never Say Never,” “G.I. Joe: Retaliation,” “Now You See Me 2” and “Crazy Rich Asians.” But his most recent movie is very relevant to the “Wicked” conversation, and that’s him doing the fellow movie musical “In the Heights” in 2021, which feels like his audition to doing “Wicked”? Now while everyone knows “Wicked,” everyone might not know that this is Part 1. That makes sense given that the original play is done in two acts. And Chu has stated that there was simply too much to shove into one movie and their goal is to do the whole production justice. But they haven’t exactly advertised that in the trailer. So some might be surprised when the movie ends halfway through the story, but “Wicked: Part 2” is currently scheduled for next year, so people shouldn’t have to wait too long to get that closure.
The competitor to “Wicked” in the box office arena is, of course, Gladiator II. While the film adaptation of “Wicked” has definitely been long awaited, I’m not so sure a sequel to “Gladiator” can quite make the same claim. In fact, when it was announced that Ridley Scott was doing a sequel, that got met with a lot of skepticism and negativity, yours truly being part of that. “Gladiator” was a massive success back in 2000, opening in May of 2000 to $34.8 million, eventually grossing $187 million domestically. According to the-numbers’ inflation adjusted tool, that would be the equivalent of a $69.6 million opening and a $375.4 million domestic total. It held very well, was very highly regarding, and eventually won best picture, which is not common for a movie of its size or a movie that opened in the first half of the year. But despite it’s massive success, is it a movie that needed a sequel? The world wasn’t sure, but Ridley Scott said yes. Ridley Scott is a great director, but he’s had his fair share of duds as of late, so he doesn’t the most clean record, which has been part of the skepticism. But the movie stars Pedro Pascal, Paul Mescal, and Denzel Washington, among others. The trailers came out and started to win people over. And now the movie has been screened by critics. And although there’s no official reviews posted yet, the early Twitter reaction has been very positive. So it looks like while one crowd of people will be off to see the big movie musical, another crowd of people will be off to see one of the final big action blockbusters of the year. And both of these can coexist with each other just fine.
But how high will each go? Conservative estimates from Variety in an article published back on November 4 says “Wicked” aiming for $80-85 million, while “Gladiator II” is looking at $55-65 million. However, Box Office Pro’s most recent Long Range Forecast has “Wicked” tracking between $100-130 million and “Gladiator II” tracking at $60-80 million. Of course we know from last month that tracking can be a funny game. But reactions to both have come out and early social media reactions have been very positive for both. “Wicked” fans have been waiting for this movie for a long time and would’ve shown up regardless. But if this movie turns out to be everything they’ve hoped for, that only helps it even more. Could it get to the high end of the tracking and potentially even get close to $150 million? I have no idea. But at this point, I wouldn’t be surprised. And has pointed out, the original “Gladiator” opened to what adjusts to around $70 million in today’s ticket prices. A lot of people love “Gladiator” and if the sequel does it justice, this also looks like a big winner. And that’s why I bring up “Barbenheimer.” Even if “Glicked” isn’t the same cultural phenomenon, the box office numbers have the potential of coming close. “Barbenheimer” combined for $244.5 million on their opening weekend. It seems reasonable that “Glicked” could combine for at least $200 million, if not more, if all goes well.
Certain to be lost in the shuffle of all of this is a third wide release of this weekend, Bonhoeffer: Pastor. Spy. Assassin, the latest movie from Angel Studios. The title and especially subtitle there does a good job of describing this movie on its own, but this is a historical drama that tells the story of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a pastor who lived during Hitler’s Nazi regime who was very vocally opposed to the Nazis and joined a deadly plot to try to assassinate Hitler. A journey over to his Wikipedia page informed me how that went, but I won’t share that here. But an Angel Studios movie about a historical character of faith reminds me very much of “Cabrini” from March of this year, which opened to $7.2 million and made $19.5 million total domestically. Angel Studios might never replicate the success of “Sound of Freedom,” which made nearly $200 million in its run, but if this catches on with the target crowd, a run similar to that of “Cabrini” could be considered a success.
November 27 – Dec 1
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| Disney's "Moana 2" |
Completing the “Holy Trinity” of movie-going this Thanksgiving is the one that could potentially be the biggest of the three and that’s Moana 2. As an animated movie directed at a family audience, this movie’s target audience is much different than both “Wicked” and “Gladiator II,” which are both different from each other. That means it’ll be easier for all three to co-exist, reaching different audiences over the course the Thanksgiving week and beyond. And yes, “Moana 2” is the only new release of this final weekend of November and it opens on Wednesday the 27th, a five-day stretch that Disney really loves. It’s been their tradition most years to release either a Pixar movie or a Walt Disney Animation Studios movie on this weekend and they’ve seen a lot of success, including the original “Moana” itself back in 2016. The story behind this sequel sees Disney appearing to learn from their recent mistakes. When COVID hit, Disney went all-in on their Disney+ strategy, thinking that was the future of movies, so they tried to get a head start and pushed everything to Diseny+, often ditching the theatrical window. Maybe in the moment that didn’t seem like the worst idea. A lot of studios thought streaming was the future of cinema. But no, the theatrical experience has very much survived and has proven to be the more financially successful route. Streaming is still good. But you give the biggest movies their theatrical run first and then put them to streaming. And I bring this up in context of “Moana 2” because this was initially set to be a straight-to-Disney+ streaming show. It wasn’t until earlier this year that they decided to that multiple episode show into a “Moana” sequel and put that into theaters instead. Might it backfire in regards to movie quality to edit a series into a movie late in the process? Perhaps. But financially it’s poised to be a great decision.
The first “Moana” in 2016 opened to $82.1 million over its first five days in this exact window in Thanksgiving 2016. It’s traditional Friday to Sunday 3-day opening officially goes down as $56.6 million. So that’s the baseline level of success here and about the range that many of these Disney movies have opened to in the past. “Moana” finished with $248.8 million domestically and $686 million worldwide. It wasn’t even the highest Disney movie that year or the highest animated movie over the holidays that season. “Sing” from Illumination ended up outgrossing it. But it’s cultural relevance has certainly outlasted just about everything. YouTuber Dan Murrell has a weekly box office and streaming show where he gathers streaming data from various sources on a weekly basis and “Moana” still manages to make the weekly top 10 in most weeks when it comes to library titles across all streaming services. It’s become one of the highest, if not the highest streamed movie across all streaming platforms. It was one of the highest streamed movies overall of last year, close to a decade after its release. And it’s almost certain to be Disney+’s highest streamed movie ever. So that’s why we’re going both a “Moana 2” right now and a live-action remake of “Moana” in 2026. When Disney gets numbers like these, they capitalize. And thus it makes sense that Box Office Pro has “Moana 2” tracking to make $120-150 million over its 5-day weekend. I personally look at “Frozen 2” because of this. That movie opened the weekend before Thanksgiving, so it’s not the perfect comparison, but that had an opening of $130.3 million domestically before eventually become the highest grossing animated movie off all-time worldwide, a mark it held until “Inside Out 2” topped it this year.
