TAGGED AS: Box Office, Horror, movies, news
“Time… is on our side” — said no one from the Final Destination movies. But apparently yes it is. Fourteen years have passed since the fifth entry in the franchise came and went with the lowest domestic gross of them all. The joke is on anyone who thought that was a bad thing, as all of these films have turned a profit, and boy, is number six turning one as well. Not only has it already usurped the home front grosses of part five, but in its first week, it is going to be the highest-grossing of the entire series.
When Lionsgate released Saw X in 2023, it had been just two years the Chris Rock-starring Spiral, which was released four years after the reboot of Jigsaw, which came seven years after the supposed conclusion of Saw 3-D. Saw X did pretty well too, making the most money since Saw V back in 2008. Final Destination 5 debuted in August 2011 to $18 million, just two years after The Final Destination rode a pre-Labor Day weekend opening to a destination over $66 million. Final Destination Bloodlines just said, “Hold my beer, but could you not put it so close to the edge of the table that it falls and lands on the electrical wire connected to the faulty power line tower that might crush my face?” Yes, it said that, and it opened to $51.7 million, higher than the domestic totals of both Final Destination 5 ($42 million) and Final Destination 2 ($46 million), and by the end of Monday, it will have outgrossed the original and No. 3.
Horror fans may be looking for fresh material, but when it comes to broadening the base, a good name recognition franchise is where its at. Sinners is certainly filling the bill in the fresh department, but beyond that, the horror boon has mostly revolved around titles audiences already know. Apart from the works of Osgood Perkins (with a nod to Stephen King), the genre films that have been making the money as of late have been A Quiet Place, Alien, Smile, Terrifier, and every horror fan knows the name of Nosferatu. This is in no way a knock on the numbers for Final Destination, which are quite impressive, nor is it shutting down any of the small-budget efforts turning a profit despite being far less attended. But this is where horror is thriving. Bloodlines is only the second film in the franchise to get a fresh rating with critics, and do I mean fresh. It’s currently Certified Fresh at 93% on the Tomatometer, compared to a merely Fresh 63% for the fifth entry. It is only the seventh wide release (in over 2,000 theaters) to score 90% or higher with critics this year, and with the Memorial Day holiday coming up next week, this is destined to be the first film in the franchise to pass the $100 million line. It already has internationally with $102 million, and it only needs another $84 million to be the highest-grossing global entry in the series.
Final Destination Bloodlines may have one of the best critic scores of the year, but we also saw the worst open this weekend. Trey Edwards Shults’ Hurry Up Tomorrow is being called a vanity promotion project for The Weeknd (aka Abel Tesfaye, playing himself and with co-writing credit). The Lionsgate release is currently at a 19% on the Tomatometer, the lowest of 2025 for a film released in over 2,000 theaters (the film is in 2,020 theaters). Lower than Love Hurts (19%), Flight Risk (27%), The Alto Knights (38%) and Snow White (42%). Shults is a filmmaker who has been shown much love from critics, too, from his debut Krisha (95%) to his apocalyptic thriller It Comes at Night (88%) to his tragic family drama Waves (84%), all Certified Fresh. You may recall The Weeknd as part of HBO’s much derided series The Idol, which earned a similarly dismal 19% from critics. Hurry Up Tomorrow opened to just $3.3 million, but reportedly cost only $15 million.
Now we turn to Marvel’s Thunderbolts* in its pursuit of $200 million. In its third weekend, the film pulled in $16.5 million, bringing its 17-day total to $155.4 million, just above The Day After Tomorrow ($153.1 million), X-Men Origins: Wolverine ($150.9 million), and Pitch Perfect 2 ($147.5 million) on the May chart. None of those films made it to $200 million, and their third weekends were all within $300,000 of each other, between $14.53-$14.82 million. Thunderbolts is a bit higher and looking at a Memorial Day weekend — albeit against a pair of new heavy-hitters. Plus it is now on a path only slightly better than Thor and possibly only getting itself to around $195 million. Furthering that speculation, Captain America: Brave New World was about $8 million ahead of Bolts at 17 days and had a third weekend not far under at $14.85 million. Thunderbolts should gain on Cap over the holiday weekend, but could face further dips afterwards. Globally the film has just passed $325 million, but at a budget equal to Brave New World, which grossed over $415 million worldwide and is considered a miss, Thunderbolts could come up now with even less.
Now we move on to a film hoping to chase down a $300 million domestic gross, even if we established last week those odds were low. Ryan Coogler’s Sinners pulled in $15 million in its fifth week. That is already among the 35-best fifth weekends of all time, and it puts the film at $240.8 million, which is a few million ahead of where Captain America: The Winter Soldier was at this point with only a $7.7 million fifth weekend. The march to $300 million may be closer than people think, as Sinners’ fifth go is much better than even Christmas holiday releases like Meet the Fockers and Sing. These are more like debut Narnia numbers, which would suggest a path around $285 million. This film is not going away and will, as previously stated in this column, remain a top five film through Memorial Day weekend. The film is over $300 million globally, and at this rate, it may just best The Hangover as the highest-grossing original R-rated film of all time.
Continuing to go step by step with the milestones, here we are in fourth place with A Minecraft Movie, which cleared $400 million last week. Another $5.8 million puts its total over $416 million. That’s over $11 million ahead of where Shrek 2 was after 45 days back in 2004, and it finished with over $441 million domestic. Minecraft is headed for a total around there and is still holding out hope for an even bigger number. As of this weekend it is approximately $72 million away from cracking a billion.
The Accountant 2 is not going to hit any of the above milestones, but it continues to put up a fight. Its $4.9 million weekend four gives it a total of $59 million. Looking over late April releases from the past, you can see Sydney Pollack’s The Interpreter at $61.1 million after 24 days and a $4.59 million fourth weekend. That opens up The Accountant sequel’s path to $70 million domestic, which is not far below the original’s $86 million. However, the budget on the sequel was nearly doubled, and globally the film has yet to hit $100 million, which should put the brakes on any victory laps. But hey, if there is still hope for a third Den of Thieves film (after the sequel’s $57.2 million global take), then the math may not matter for a third Accountant either.
In seventh place is IFC’s Clown in a Cornfield, whose numbers are incomparable to any of the films in front of it, but it’s still a nice victory for the indie company. Last week, its $3.6 million start was the best opening ever for them — still impressive, despite a limited array of wide openings. Now at $6.3 million, it’s the sixth-highest grossing film in their history behind The Death of Stalin ($8 million), last year’s Late Night with the Devil ($10 million), Y tu mamá también ($13.8 million), Boyhood ($25.3 million), and the mother of all indie releases, My Big Fat Greek Wedding ($241.4 million).
A24 may have something on its hand with Andrew DeYoung’s Friendship. The Tim Robinson/Paul Rudd comedy had a sellout screening at the recent Chicago Critics Film Festival (which, full disclosure, I produce). It then had the highest per-theater average of the year last week. This week it made it into the top 10 playing in just 60 theaters and grossing $1.4 million for a PTA of $23,338. That is in league with second weekend expansions for Oscar players like Midnight In Paris ($1.92 million, 58 theaters), Little Miss Sunshine ($1.48 million, 58 theaters), and Spotlight ($1.35 million, 61 theaters). Those films all grossed between $44-60 million. Let’s see how it performs when it opens wide for the upcoming holiday weekend. Rounding out the top 10, we have Sony’s horror video game adaptation Until Dawn with $800,000, bringing its total to just under $20 million. And finally, 20th Century Studios’ The Amateur got itself over $40 million domestic with $712,000.
In what promises to be a huge Memorial Day weekend at the box office, Disney is going to forget all about Snow White once Lilo & Stitch opens. It should lead the way over the holiday with one of the biggest openings of the year in what should become one of the highest-grossing films of the summer. Tom Cruise also says goodbye to one of the great action franchises of all-time with Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning. The last chapter is Certified Fresh at 81% and hoping to break the ceiling on its box office haul and put the disappointing returns of the last film behind it. Angel Studios also hopes to crack the top 10 again with Neil McDonough trying to find faith while bullriding in The Last Rodeo, from the director of Fried Green Tomatoes.
Erik Childress can be heard each week evaluating box office on Business First AM with Angela Miles and his Movie Madness Podcast. [box office figures via Box Office Mojo]
Thumbnail image by ©Marvel Studios
