By Nathaniel R
It was a strange weekend for moviegoers. Hollywood wanted to give Black Panther 2 ample room and it's not quite thanksgiving so only two new wide releases risked opening: The Menu and She Said. The former did okay and the latter struggled. In limited release a slightly similar story but just remove a few 0s as Bones and All and The Inspection both opened on a handful of screens. In both box office skirmishes, moviegoers tended to chose the violent option. Violent thrills are really what sells movie tickets these days, with or without vfx budgets. We wish the general moviegoer had wider taste, but it is what it is...
| Weekend Box Office (actuals) November 18th-20th 🔺 = new or expanding / ★ = Recommended |
|
| WIDE (OVER 800 SCREENS) | LIMITED / PLATFORM |
 BLACK PANTHER WAKANDA FOREVER |
 BONES AND ALL |
| 1 BLACK PANTHER WAKANDA FOREVER $66.4 (cum. $287.1) | 1 TILL $228k (cum. $8.5) 656 screens |
| 2 🔺★ THE MENU $9 *NEW* | 2 ★ TÁR $184k (cum. $4.9) 205 screens |
| 3 BLACK ADAM $4.6 (cum. $157.1) | 3 ★ TRIANGLE OF SADNESS (sweden/uk) $170k (cum. $3.8) |
| 4 ★ TICKET TO PARADISE $3.1 (cum. $61.5) | 4 🔺 BONES AND ALL $121k *NEW* 5 screens |
| 5 🔺★ SHE SAID $2.2 *NEW* | 5 ★ DECISION TO LEAVE (south korea) $91k (cum. $1.7) 96 screens |
| 6 LYLE LYLE CROCODILE $1.9 (cum. $43.1) |
6 ★ THE FABELMANS $89k (cum. $309k) 4 screens |
 BANSHEES OF INISHERIN |
 AFTERSUN |
|
7 SMILE $1.1 (cum. $104.5) |
7 TERRIFIER 2 $75k (cum. $10.5) 180 screens |
| 8 PREY FOR THE DEVIL $919k (cum. $18.3) |
8 ★ AFTERSUN $75k (cum. $689k) 97 screens |
| 9 ★ THE BANSHEES OF INISHERIN $729K (cum. $7.1) | 9 ★ THE INSPECTION $65k *NEW* 5 screens |
| There are only 9 movies currently in wide release | 10 MEET ME IN THE BATHROOM $24k (cum. $278k) 29 screens |
| ...that is way too few for a healthy film culture | 11 EO $24k *NEW* 2 screens |
| ...do better Hollywood | 12 BAD AXE (doc) $9k *NEW* 24 screens |
Hopefully with wider awareness of "awards season" and "best" conversations coming for the holidays the awards hopefuls will pick up some steam. Hollywood may think the industry can thrive on franchises alone but it really can't. Variety is needed for the health of the movies. They've conditioned people --as we've been warning readers about for 20 years now!!! -- to only think about films as art or as worthy to see even if they aren't "spectacles" for a short period of time each year (December-February). The results have been fairly catastrophic. But at least people do still tune in to what's considered "best" somewhat during these months, as the conditioning suggested.
ANYWAY... support things other than franchises in movie theaters. Please!
What have you watched this week? I hit two critics screenings for Devotion (the year's other aviation drama) and Babylon and also finally caught up with Aftersun which I should have jumped right on after the festival praise. It's enthralling while it's playing but even better once it's had time to linger.
THE HOLIDAY WEEKEND
The big new movie for the kids this holiday weekend is Disney's Strange World though we hope families with older kids who can handle adult themes will consider Steven Spielberg's The Fabelmans which is about a family or the aviation drama Devotion. Since Thanksgiving is a big moviegoing time that's not all. The gory romantic drama Bones and All is expanding quickly, the Knives Out comic mystery sequel Glass Onion gets a one week only theatrical release timed to the holiday and other awards hopefuls do their Oscar qualifying or platform releases: All the Beauty and the Bloodshed, The Nanny, The Son, The Corridors of Power, Freedom on Fire: Ukraine's Fight for Freedom, and White Noise.