Box Office Report for the Week of September 15

Another Lionsgate movie, another disappointing box office return, with The Killer’s Game grossing a lousy $2.6 million out of a $30 million budget. It won’t be the biggest bomb of the year for the studio, but they simply cannot seem to catch a break ever since Borderlands released. The studio has another movie out next week (Never Let Go), which could do much better than The Killer’s Game, but in two weeks, Megalopolis unleashes into the world and could open at $5 million. The reported budget for the movie is over $100 million. Still, since Francis Ford Coppola himself financed the movie, it may not be a complete loss for the studio compared to Borderlands and The Crow, which have now both been released on VOD.

Meanwhile, the biggest movie of the weekend, Speak No Evil, ended up in second place with an $11.5 million tally but could not reach the heights set by Beetlejuice Beetlejuice‘s juggernaut $51 million for this weekend, one of the best-seen for the month in a long time. It speaks to the power of Tim Burton as an artist and how popular the character of Betelgeuse has been for multiple generations over the past thirty-six years.

Speak No Evil benefitted from a small budget ($15 million) and already made its money back in one weekend, grossing $20 million worldwide. As bad as the trailers were, the reviews were surprisingly positive and helped bolster a fun word-of-mouth for James Watkins‘ American remake of the 2022 Danish film by Christian Tafdrup. I have my reservations about the remake, but it’s certainly a crowd-pleasing movie that horror aficionados may very well eat up and recommend to their friends.

Some smaller movies also opened strongly this weekend, with God’s Not Dead: In God We Trust raking up $1.5 million in Fathom screenings. In contrast, the controversial Daily Wire movie Am I Racist? opened at $4.8 million in 1,517 theatres.

With Beetlejuice Beetlejuice still holding out strong this weekend, the question remains if it will do just as well next week as Transformers One is ready to eat a bite out of the cake and perhaps be a strong contender for first place. However, with the franchise receiving diminishing returns ever since The Last Knight, and despite this one being the best-reviewed Transformers movie, it could potentially disappoint. Time will tell, but it will undoubtedly be an exciting battle to watch!

Here is the full list of the top ten films of the weekend:

1. Beetlejuice Beetlejuice (Warner Bros): $51.6M (-54%) – 4,575 theatres
2. Speak No Evil (Universal): $11.5M – 3,375 theatres
3. Deadpool & Wolverine (Disney): $5.2M (-26%) – 3,075 theatres
4. Am I Racist? (SDG Releasing): $4.8M – 1,517 theatres
5. Reagan (Showbiz Direct Distribution): $3.0M (-39%) – 2,450 theatres
6. The Killer’s Game (Lionsgate): $2.6M – 2,623 theatres
7. Alien: Romulus (Disney): $2.4M (-39%) – 1,950 theatres
8. It Ends with Us (Sony): $2.1M (-45%) – 2,209 theatres
9. The Forge (Sony): $2.0M (-33%) – 1,614 theatres
10. God’s Not Dead: In God We Trust (Fathom Events): $1.5M – 1,392 theatres

Source: Comscore