Dwayne Johnson and Chris Evans‘ Christmas movie Red One topped Friday’s domestic box office chart with nearly $11 million. The question now is whether it can hit is target and unwrap a $30 million opening.
Amazon MGM Studios has always believed the movie is a Saturday and Sunday play, versus Friday (one major distraction on Friday was the Mike Tyson-Jake Paul fight on Netflix, although the majority, or 54 percent, of Red One ticket buyers on opening day were male).
Red One is playing in a total of 4,032 North American cinemas this weekend, including Imax, Dolby Cinema and other premium large-format screens. While many critics didn’t care for the action-adventure film, audiences felt the opposite and gave it an A- CinemaScore. Amazon originally intended to send the film straight to its streaming service Prime Video but gave it the big-screen treatment in hopes of providing a boost for exhibitors.
Heading into an otherwise quiet weekend, tracking showed the movie opening in the $30 million to $35 million range domestically. Warner Bros. Pictures is distributing the Seven Bucks production overseas, where Red One opened to $28 million in order to avoid a direct showdown with Paramount’s Gladiator II, which is launching this weekend at the international box office a week ahead of its domestic debut. (Ridley Scott’s Gladiator sequel could do as much as $80 million or more in its foreign bow.)
Red One‘s box office performance will be closely monitored, considering it cost $250 million to make. A major legacy studio in the same situation would come under intense scrutiny if a film carrying that price tag opened to those numbers, but Amazon insists its business model is different and fueled by subscribers and not just box office. It’s also counting on Red One to play throughout the year-end holidays and become a holiday classic for years to come.
Nevertheless, it would be a disappointment if it doesn’t clear $30 million.
Red One is the first proper Christmas movie to play in theaters since before the pandemic when The Grinch opened in 2018.
The family-friendly pic follows what happens when Santa Claus — whose code name is “Red One” — is kidnapped and the North Pole’s head of security (Johnson) must team up with the world’s most infamous bounty hunter (Evans) in what Amazon MGM describes as a globe-trotting, action-packed mission to save Christmas.
Directed by Jake Kasdan from a screenplay by Chris Morgan and a story by Hiram Garcia, Red One also stars Lucy Liu, Kiernan Shipka, Bonnie Hunt, Kristofer Hivju, Nick Kroll, Wesley Kimmel and J.K. Simmons. It is rated PG-13 in the U.S., where reviews haven’t been kind.
Red One is the first in a series of year-end tentpoles preparing to open and, if all goes well, put the box office back on Santa’s nice list after a tough fall due to lack of product. Universal’s Wicked and Paramount’s Gladiator II both debut on Nov. 22, followed by Walt Disney Animation’s Moana 2 on Nov. 27. (Many have dubbed the high-profile corridor “Moanapocalypse” or “Glicked.)
Numbers will be updated Sunday morning.
