Year in Review: Greatly Abbreviated Box Office Lists and 'What Ifs'
Sunday, January 3, 2021 at 9:41PM the year in review lists are winding down but not quite yet done!
If you had predicted that Bad Boys 3 would be the biggest grosser of 2020 in January, nobody would have believed you.
We shan't rehash what's happened to movie theaters this past year (everyone knows). But normally at this time we have tons of fun compiling extensive deep-dive lists of how well movies of various genres and types of releases did. And of course we can reflect on how the success impacted their awards chances (Parasite never would have won Best Picture without that incredible theatrical run, becoming the biggest subtitled hit in the US in the past 16 years. Since there was only the first three months of the year with normal box office the lists are VERY strange and in some cases we just couldn't do them. But here's an extremely abbreviated version of what we normally do...
US TOP TEN BEFORE THE PANDEMIC
01. Bad Boys for Life $206.3
Released in January 17th, it was still in 1451 theaters when the pandemic hit but was mostly out of steam and on its way out of theaters.
02. Sonic the Hedgehog $146
Not quite a "surprise" as a hit but it had definitely conquered its pre-release bad buzz. Released in mid February it probably had another solid weekend in it when the pandemic hit.
03. Birds of Prey $84.1
Like Bad Boys for Life it was already leaving theaters when the pandemic hit
04. Dolittle $77
Was just about out of theaters so this was the number it would have reached. Not a huge success given the genre, studio, and star.
05. The Invisible Man $70.4
Definitely had a bit of juice in it still when the pandemic hit. Would have surpassed Dolittle it not Birds of Prey
06. Call of the Wild $62.3
Released in mid February it probably had a couple more okay weekends in it when the pandemic hit.
07. Onward $61.5
Was only entering its third week when theaters closed so it would have moved up on the list
08. The Gentleman $36.4
09. Fantasy Island $27.3
10. Like a Boss $22.1
Just outside the List: The Grudge and The Photograph
US TOP TEN POST PANDEMIC
01. Tenet $57.9
02. 🔺 The Croods: New Age $34.5
03. 🔺 Wonder Woman 1984 $28.5
04. The New Mutants $23.8
05. Unhinged $20.8
06. 🔺 The War with Grandpa $18.6
07. Honest Thief $14.1
08. Come Play $9.5
09. Let Him Go $9.3
10. 🔺 Freaky $8.7
Just outside the list: 🔺 Monster Hunter and News of the World (both only in their second week at theaters)
US TOP FIVE ANIMATED
* released after the pandemic
01 Onward $61.5
02 🔺 Croods New Age* $34.5
03 My Hero Academia: Heroes Rising $13.3
04 Weathering with You $7.7
05 The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge on the Run* $4.8
US TOP TEN FEMALE DIRECTED
* released after the pandemic
01 Birds of Prey $84.1
02 🔺 Wonder Woman 1984* $28.5
03 The Photograph $20.5
04 The Turning $15.4
05 Emma. $10 (still had steam in it when the pandemic hit. sigh)
06 The Rhythm Section $5.4
07 Broken Hearts Gallery* $4.0
08 Portrait of a Lady on Fire $3.7
09 The Lodge $2.1
10 🔺 Promising Young Woman* $1.8
Just outside the list: The Assistant and Relic* both broke $1 million. (First Cow and Never Rarely Sometimes Always had both just been introduced when the pandemic broke but we'll never know how well they might have expanded with critical fever or if they would have vanished quickly only to be rediscovered on streaming when critics top ten lists began)
US LIMITED RELEASE ONLY
never played in more than 800 theaters
* released after the pandemic
01. Spongebob Movie: Sponge on the Run* $4.8
02. Portrait of a Lady on Fire (France) $3.7
03. Oscar Nominated Short Films $3.3
04. My Boyfriend's Meds (Mexico) $2.9
05. The Last Full Measure $2.9
06. After We Collided* $2.3
07. The Lodge $2.1
08. The Wretched* $1.8
09. The Rental* $1.6
10. Train to Busan Presents Peninsula* (South Korea) $1.2
Just outside the List: True to the Game 2*, The Assistant, Love and Monsters*, Relic, and The Tax Collector*
GLOBAL TOP 10
01 The Eight Hundred* (China) $472.5
02 My People My Homeland* (China) $433.2
03 Bad Boys for Life (US) $424.2
04 Tenet* (US/UK) $362.6
05 🔺 Demon Slayer the Movie: Mugen Train* (Japan) $305.4
06 Sonic the Hedgehog (US) $304.9
07 Dolittle (US) $250.9
08 Legend of Deification* (China) $243.8
09 Birds of Prey (US) $201.8
10 The Sacrifice* (China) $172
Just outside the list: The Invisible Man (US), Onward (US), After We Collided (US), 🔺 Wonder Woman 1984 (US), 🔺 Croods New Age (US)
With the US out of comission all year but many other countries including China, getting their pandemic under control with government restrictions, US films were not the top grossers for once; 50% of the top global grossers from the top ten list this year came from Asia (mostly China but one very popular Japanese title, too).
After the pandemic it's tough to say but obviously Tenet has done fairly well given the dire circumstances under which it was released. $362 million during a pandemic suggests that it would have been a bigger hit than Dunkirk (global gross $519.6) and possibly Interstellar, too (global gross $652.5) had it played in a normal year.
OH WHAT MIGHT HAVE BEEN THIS PAST FILM YEAR... DUNE, WEST SIDE STORY, BLACK WIDOW. And what would have been the small film to break out in a huge way?
What do you make of these lists?
Reader Comments (10)
I think FIRST COW might have been a true art-house sleeper that chugged along in theaters for months, going far beyond the normal big film towns. The revival house/art house theater where I live (little old Bryan, TX) was about to book it for late Spring when the pandemic hit and they had to shut down. I think it could have been a true sleeper with a long shelf life.
I’m not sure what film over another, but I do believe A film would have captured the zeitgeist. What sucks about 2020 is that no one film did. Not one release made an impact on the culture. The closest thing we had was Hamilton, Tiger King and Queens Gambit.
It’s sad because in any year a few films dominate both the popular and cinephilia culture.
That didn’t happen in 2020.
Imagine if Nomadland got a Parasite-like rollout? Or Minari? Or hell even Collective?
I don't think there's a post-pandemic as we're still in a pandemic. Other countries have probably have things under control but as long as we have Kirk Cameron doing stupid prayer circles. We're nowhere near finished with this pandemic.
US TOP TEN FEMALE DIRECTED??
Why is this separate? The newfound politically correctness is starting to become racist. Someone could then say "Why not US TOP TEN DIRECTED BY AFRICAN AMERICAN or US TOP TEN DIRECTED BY A MAN UNDER 30 or a WOMAN UNDER 30 or STARRING AN ANIMAL or TAKING PLACE IN WASHINGTON or HAWAII or LONDON". You could fill many pages in this site, but what does this show or indicate? Do you mean that filmgoers choose what film to see based on the gender of the director? Just curious?
Manos-
Why do you hate women?
Manos -- i just think it's interesting. we broke it down into many categories last year just as you feared in your comment ;)
thevoid99 -- i didn't mean post pandemic as in its over but post...as in after it started.
As for zeitgeist-y films, can this be meant in a BAD way too because if so I feel like the one-two punch of TENET and WONDER WOMAN from WB fit the bill. Both of their release strategies were HIGHLY reacted upon by not just the general public but the industry as well. In Tenet's case, the whole experiment to force theaters to open early convinced the studios to shift their 2021 slate to HBO MAX which is a pretty BIG cultural impact. As for Wonder Woman, I don't know anyone over the holidays who saw it and didn't have strong THOUGHTS about what went wrong about that film. It seems to have been a fitting cap of the year for Gadot who just couldn't do anything correct this year and a boon to those people who think all superhero movies are the same and suck.
ANYWAYS... wow SONIC was really the highest grossing film I saw last year? I never would've guessed that.
@Gary
A master of psychology like you could expect any of the following answers
1. Because i want to be one, since i am gay
2. Because deep inside i want to be one, since i am secretly gay
3. Because i hate my mother
4. Because i love my mother
5. Because i am a woman and hate competition
Or maybe it could be an honest question that defies the Help-Yourself books you are obviously reading.
I feel like THE INVISIBLE MAN was just starting to draw more eyeballs to it when cinemas shut down. It could have been a mainstream hit that became more of a phenomenon.
I'd be a bit surprised - but not totally shocked - if Elisabeth Moss showed up in the 5th Best Actress slot (after McDormand, Davis, Kirby and Mulligan) at SAG or the Golden Globes.
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