'Old' Wins Quiet Box Office Weekend With $16.5 Million Opening
Universal's "Old" has taken No. 1 on a quiet box office weekend, becoming the seventh film from director M. Night Shyamalan to take the top spot at the box office with a $16.5 million opening from 3,355 locations.
The bad news is that a mix of tepid reception and the spread of the COVID-19 Delta variant has made "Old" the lowest opening of Shyamalan's career, falling beneath the $18 million earned by "Lady in the Water" in 2006. The film received a C+ on CinemaScore and a 52% Rotten Tomatoes score, though even with the weak reception the $18 million film is likely to turn a profit. Overseas, the film added $6.5 million from 23 markets for a global launch total of $23 million.
Paramount's "G.I. Joe" spinoff "Snake Eyes" is in second with a $13.3 million opening from 3,521 locations. It's a big drop from the $51 million four-day opening of "G.I. Joe: Retaliation" in 2013 and sets the $88 million blockbuster up to flop at the box office. Paramount co-produced the film with Skydance and Hasbro with MGM co-financing. Like "Old," reception was similarly tepid with a B- on CinemaScore going with a 42% Rotten Tomatoes score.
Marvel Studios' "Black Widow" is in third with $11.6 million in its third weekend. After taking a steep second weekend drop that led the National Association of Theater Owners to lash out at Disney's hybrid release strategy for the film, "Black Widow" had a more respectable third weekend drop of just 55%. The global box office total now stands at $314.9 million, with a release in China still to come.
Likely to fuel NATO's complaints about hybrid release models is the second weekend of Warner Bros.' "Space Jam: A New Legacy." After opening No. 1 to $31 million, the Looney Tunes film fell 69% to $9.5 million in its second weekend, bringing its domestic 10-day total to $51.3 million. Like all Warner Bros. films, "Space Jam 2" is available on HBO Max at no extra charge; though while Disney hasn't made any long term commitments to theatrical exclusivity with its films, Warner Bros. has made deals with theaters committing to exclusivity after 2021.
Completing the top five is Universal's "F9," which became the first Hollywood film released after theaters reopened to gross over $600 million worldwide. The film took $4.7 million in its fifth weekend in North America and $16 million worldwide, bringing its total to $621 million.
Read original story 'Old' Wins Quiet Box Office Weekend With $16.5 Million Opening At TheWrap
