Box office: ‘Night Swim’ fails to beat ‘Wonka’ in first weekend of year

Edward Douglas
·4 min read
2

Last week, Blumhouse’s new horror film “Night Swim” seemed to have a good chance at winning the weekend box office, except it didn’t deliver on its potential, and a history of horror doing well the first weekend of January, settling for second place. Read on for the weekend box office report.

“Night Swim” was the only new wide release on the first weekend of the year but with horrible reviews, it didn’t stand a chance against Timothée Chalamet‘s musical prequel “Wonka” which won its third weekend at the box office with an estimated $14.4 million, down 36% from last weekend. The movie has grossed $164.8 million domestically, making it one of the bigger hits from the fall. (By comparison, “The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songs and Snakes” has grossed almost the same amount despite opening a full month earlier.)

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“Night Swim” opened for Thursday previews, which brought in just $1.5 million, but word-of-mouth was in line with the reviews – the movie received a terrible “C” CinemaScore – so on Sunday morning, it had only grossed an estimated $12 million in 3,250 theaters. It hasn’t done much better overseas, with just $5.6 million in 36 territories for a $17.7 million global opening.

SEE Grab the popcorn and sound off in our movie forums

Last year on this weekend, “M3GAN” opened with more than $30 million but also failed to beat the long-standing hit, James Cameron‘s “Avatar: The Way of Water,” which made $45.8 million. That also gives you some idea how poorly the box office is doing this year compared to last.

A few of the holiday releases continued to do better than others, with the animated “Migration” from Illumination Entertainment remaining in third place with $10.3 million, down just 39% from last weekend. Its Sunday estimate was clearly affected by the snowstorm hitting the country, which likely kept many potential family audiences home.

Unfortunately, Jason Momoa‘s “Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom,” his final appearance as the DC character, just hasn’t been able to hold up its business, this weekend dropping to fourth place with $10.6 million, down 42%. Then again, it also crossed the $100 million mark this weekend, unlike the most recent Marvel movie, “The Marvels.”

Sony’s rom-com “Anyone But You,” starring Sydney Sweeney and Glen Powell, is turning out to be a bigger hit than anyone expected, as it was up 9% from last weekend to take fifth place with $9.5 million and $43.7 million total domestic.

SEE Box office: All time domestic top-grossing movies

George Clooney‘s “The Boys in the Boat,” released by Amazon, is also doing well, taking sixth place with $6 million, down just 29% from last weekend, with $33.9 million grossed in North America so far.

Warner Bros’ third movie in theaters, the musical “The Color Purple,” had the biggest drop in the top 10, down to 7th place with $4.8 million (down 59%) with a domestic gross of $54.6 million. The movie has plumetted quite drastically since making $18.1 million on Christmas Day, despite receiving the same “A” CinemaScore as “Boys in the Boat” and “Migration.”

Even A24’s “The Iron Claw,” starring Zac Efron, held up quite well in its post New Year’s Day weekend with $4.5 million, down just 10% from last weekend, to take eighth place, as it has racked up $24.9 million domestic. It was followed by Michael Mann‘s “Ferrari” in ninth place with $2.5 million, down 38%, with a total of $16 million.

Very few players had “Night Swim” winning the weekend in Gold Derby’s box office prediction game; then again, a minority of players even had it taking second place. More players had “The Color Purple” taking first or second place, despite it missing out on the top five altogether. A majority had “Aquaman” in third place and “Migration” in fourth place – also wrong – and 30 players picked “Anyone but You” to take fifth place. In other words, don’t expect too many perfect scores in this past weekend’s game.

Three new movies are opening in wide release on the Friday before Martin Luther King, Jr’s birthday, celebrated on Monday, January 15, so check back on Wednesday for a preview of what to expect.

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