‘Renfield,’ ‘Pope’s Exorcist’ Seek to Draw Horror Fans to Theaters in Mario’s Shadow

The box office headlines for the rest of April will likely be written by “The Super Mario Bros. Movie” as it makes a bid for a $1 billion global gross total, but several niche films like Universal’s “Renfield” and Sony/Screen Gems’ “The Pope’s Exorcist” will try to find success in Mario’s shadow.

“Renfield” stars Nicolas Cage and Nicholas Hoult as Dracula and his beleaguered assistant Renfield, the latter of whom decides to stand up to his abusive vampiric master for the first time in centuries. “The Pope’s Exorcist” stars Russell Crowe in a horror film based on the writings of Gabriele Amorth, a Catholic priest who claimed to have performed tens of thousands of exorcisms in his lifetime.

Neither R-rated film is expected to take No. 1 from “Super Mario Bros.,” with independent tracking for both films maxing out in the low teens. Sony is projecting a $10 million opening for “Pope’s Exorcist,” while Universal is projecting a $9 million opening for “Renfield.”

For “Pope’s Exorcist,” that should be enough to turn a modest profit theatrically as the film was made on a reported $18 million budget in keeping with Screen Gems’ strategy of releasing horror films on the cheap. Early reviews have been mildly positive with a 64% Rotten Tomatoes score, so the film should post a decent $40-$50 million theatrical run as long as it gets a foothold with horror fans.

But “Renfield” is looking like it will be a box office dud given the film’s net budget of $65 million. While the reviews for the horror-comedy have been generally positive with a 72% RT score, the film’s cartoonishly gory fight scenes will probably limit its play with general audiences to a point that it will have a hard time grossing enough in theaters to turn a profit against its production spend.

Still, Universal will be able to pay off any writedown incurred by “Renfield” with the windfall profits that “Super Mario Bros.” is hauling in. In just six days, “Mario” has surpassed the domestic total of “Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania” and the worldwide total of “Sonic the Hedgehog 2,” earning an Illumination record of $20 million in North America on Monday.

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If these mid-week numbers stay that high, expect fantastic legs for “Mario” throughout the month of April that could give it the domestic run needed to become the first animated film since the pandemic began to gross $1 billion worldwide.

Meanwhile, a pair of major specialty films are set to join “Renfield” and “Pope’s Exorcist” this weekend. Crunchyroll will release “Suzume,” the acclaimed anime fantasy from “Your Name” director Makoto Shinkai, with projections currently set at $5 million from 2,150 theaters.

In Japan, Shinkai’s films have become huge box office hits, with his 2016 hit “Your Name” becoming one of the top five highest grossing films ever in the country at time of release. “Suzume” has been just as successful as “Your Name,” grossing over $100 million in Japan since its release this past November. In China, “Suzume” has also become the animated film of choice with another $100 million grossed there after three weekends while “Super Mario Bros.” joined the growing pile of failed Hollywood titles in that country with just $4.7 million grossed in its opening weekend.

In the U.S., “Suzume” won’t match the box office performance of the films from franchises like “Dragon Ball” and “My Hero Academia” that Crunchyroll has released in recent years, but the distributor’s successful strategy of promoting its titles to anime fans should allow “Suzume” to outgross the $8 million earned in the U.S. by Shinkai’s last film, “Weathering With You,” in early 2020.

Finally, A24 will release Ari Aster’s genre-bending psychological horror film “Beau Is Afraid” in select theaters ahead of a wide release on April 21. Reviews for the film have been positive with 76% on Rotten Tomatoes, but with the warning that Aster’s three-hour nightmare starring Joaquin Phoenix will likely alienate many moviegoers with its nonstop bizarre imagery and meandering, seemingly disconnected storytelling.

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