Tom Cruise’s seventh sequel “Mission: Impossible,” which hit theaters Wednesday and cost at least $400 million to make and market, was supposed to mark a turning point in the turbulent summer box office. Death-defying stunts! New love interest! That’s exciting Song!
Ticket sales were strong. But the amazing (and perhaps unrealistic) result that Hollywood expected not materializedadding to concern about the movie capital’s overreliance on legacy franchises — and adding to studio dread about what kind of damage the actors’ strike might do to the rest of the summer’s high-stakes slate.
As an added inconvenience, the low-budget Sound of Freedom (Angel Studios) from outside the Hollywood system, which some critics attacked as a recruiting tool for the far-right, became a box office phenomenon.
“Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part 1,” directed and co-written by Christopher McQuarrie, took in $56.2 million over the weekend in the US and Canada, for a total of about $80 million since its Wednesday opening. Overseas, the two-hour, 43-minute film took in an additional $155 million, for a worldwide total of about $235 million, according to Paramount Pictures.
Analysts who track moviegoers’ interest and use complex formulas to predict ticket sales have predicted that Dead Reckoning Part 1 will generate about $250 million worldwide within its first five days, with the United States and Canada contributing at least $85 million. David Gross, a film consultant who publishes A.I the news on box office numbers.
“Dead Reckoning Part One,” Mr. Gross said of the extremely cheap film, which received a positive response sensational reviews. Of course, there is nothing average about this movie.
Mr. Cruz, who considered white hot as a box office draw after last year’s Top Gun: Maverick, has promoted “Dead Reckoning Part One” with his usual red carpets touring the world, in Rome, London, Abu Dhabi, Seoul, Sydney and New York. Early last week, it made a surprise debut in cinemas at preview screenings in cities like Toronto, Atlanta, and Miami.
The aggressive promotional campaign for “Dead Reckoning Part One” will be Hollywood’s last until a consortium of studios reaches a deal with SAG-AFTRA, as the union of mighty actors is known. On Friday, the union went on strike for the first time in 43 years, saying it was fed up with exorbitant pay for entertainment tycoons and worried about not receiving a fair share of the spoils of a future dominated by streaming.
In the coming weeks, studios like Universal, Sony, and Disney will have films ready for release that must dispense with the star power of promotional folks like Denzel Washington (“The Equalizer 3”), Owen Wilson, Tiffany Haddish (“Haunted Mansion”), Will Ferrell, and Jamie Foxx. (“Stress”).
For the weekend in the United States and Canada, “Dead Reckoning Part One” was shown on 4,327 screens and was No. 1, with IMAX and other high-volume venues contributing 37 percent of ticket sales. “Based on out-of-this-world survey ratings and recommendations, this was the most well-received ‘Mission’ yet, which speaks volumes about the franchise’s viability,” said Chris Aronson, Paramount’s president of domestic distribution.
Mr. Aronson made several other full glass half-notes, including that for its first five days, “Dead Reckoning Part 1” was comfortably outperforming the previous chapter in the franchise, “Fallout” (2018), in most countries overseas.
Astoundingly, given its cost (about $15 million) and its low-wattage marketing campaign, “Sound of Freedom” came in second, taking $27 million from a record 3,265 screens, for a two-week total of $86 million. Horror movie “Insidious: The Red Door,” a similarly low-budget offering from Sony Pictures, finished in third place, collecting $13 million, for a two-week total of $58 million.
“Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny” (Disney-Lucasfilm) sums up the trouble Hollywood has faced this summer by spectating the franchise, which trails the top three by nearly $12 million, with a three-week total of $145 million ($302 million). all over the world).
That’s a lot of money, but not enough for a movie that cost at least $400 million to make and market. With box office revenues split roughly 50-50 between studios and theaters, “Dial of Destiny” would have to do more than twice as well as Disney’s to make money.
Domestic ticket sales total about $5 billion for the year, down about 20 percent from the same period in 2019, the last year before the pandemic severely disrupted moviegoing. And the consequences of franchising are part of the reason for the decline. Decades of pumping for profits has left some of these properties with inferior tires.
The third “Ant-Man” movie, the tenth chapter “Fast and the Furious”, the fifth “Indiana Jones” movie, the twelfth movie (“Shazam! Fury of the Gods”) and the thirteenth movie (“The Flash”) DC has hit everyone. Extended Universe disappointed, certainly compared to their costs.
“In general, audiences are interested in more and more and more of the same thing, until they start to get complacent and excited about the next thing,” Mr. Gross, the box office consultant, wrote in his Sunday newsletter.