THE BIKERIDERS | THE EXORCISM openings | Number of films in 2024 | June 21 to 23, 2024 weekend
Opening weekend box office, charts and commentary
The current weekend: June 21 to 23, 2024
Inside Out 2 continues to electrify the market — this weekend it represents approx. 68% of the total domestic box office. Otherwise, it’s a quiet summer weekend. In a completely healthy market, an “off weekend” like this would have a film opening to $30m or more, and that would help maintain momentum. This weekend…
1) The Bikeriders opening
- Crime dramas are small movies, and the more dramatic and less action-packed, the smaller they are. This opening is good-not-great, a bit above average for a crime film, and above average for the dramatic version of the genre.
Critics' reviews are very good, while audience scores are fair (a B CinemaScore). Overseas prospects are lukewarm:
2) The Exorcism opening
- This is a poor start for a single-episode horror movie, with low weekend numbers for the genre. Critic’s reviews and audience ratings are both weak (a D CinemaScore).
Last year, The Pope's Exorcist, also starring Russell Crowe, finished with $78m worldwide, 74% of it from overseas. Mr. Crowe has a good track-record here, and any title with the letters E-X-O-R-C-I-S- is an asset in foreign and ancillary markets, but the picture isn’t working and the marketing spend should be saved:
3) Number of films in 2024
- Here are updated film counts for domestic wide releases in 2024. The number of franchise titles remains steady at 52, but the total count is growing, as new small movies appear on the calendar.
Currently, there are 122 confirmed wide releases in 2024. That number should climb to 130, and most likely higher than that:
Of course, in terms of re-building the box office, what counts are the big titles — the franchise pictures and original breakthroughs. The total number of films is not indicative of the lineup’s strength. The second half of the year is loaded with franchise pics, but there will also be more weekend gaps when the momentum slows.
- Next week we'll have June box office totals, with year-to-date comparisons to last year and to 2017-to-2019 pre-pandemic averages.