The age of Thames has come to an end. After two weeks of pure market dominance, in which burgeoning Hollywood star Mason Thames held the top two slots at the box office with Black Phone 2 and Regretting You, a new box office king emerges: the Predator. Predator: Badlands, the second Dan Tractenberg-directed Yautja epic, scored the biggest opening in the franchise’s history with $40 million at the weekend box office, per The Numbers estimates. We can thank that plucky, legless Elle Fanning-bot for the assist.
It’s not that surprising that the Killer of Killers would mow down the competition. In addition to invisibility and infrared vision, Predator is the first major studio release in two weeks aimed at mass audiences. It was basically an open killing field for the big guy, who only had adult-oriented dramas “they don’t make anymore” to worry about. To that end, it was another disappointing weekend for auteur-driven projects, middle-brow docudramas, and inspirational stories for the whole family, with the latter doing the best of the new releases. Sarah’s Oil, the Zachary Levi-led true story about a little girl oil baron, struck $4.458 million from viewers’ limited money reserves. Meanwhile, the future dad-movie classic Nuremberg made $4 million. The low returns are perhaps unsurprising for a society friendlier to Nazis than international law. However, even Russell Crowe breaking from exorcisms to play an actual demon wasn’t enough to possess audiences. We bet this will crush on streaming, though.
Speaking of eugenics, Crowe proved a bigger draw than Sydney Sweeney’s good jeans. Her combat sports biopic, Christy, the story of legendary female boxer Christy Martin, suffered a worse fate than Smashing Machine, grossing just $950,000. One must begin to wonder about the viability of Sydney Sweeney, the world’s most discussed movie star. Since she enjoyed the box office success of Anyone But You, she has starred in Madame Web, Eden, Echo Valley, Americana, and now Christy. Not exactly an encouraging run, but she does have 2025’s second Hand That Rocks The Cradle update on the way in Paul Fieg’s The Housemaid.
But it’s not just Sweeney that’s struggling. Academy Award winner Jennifer Lawrence and Robert Pattinson also stumbled this weekend as Die, My Love, the latest from Lynne Ramsay, collected $2.83 million, coming in behind Chainsaw Man (adding $3.6 million to its $137 million global take) and Bugonia ($3.5 million). The low opening shouldn’t be a surprise, since Ramsay doesn’t make crowd pleasers, and the D+ CinemaScore suggests the crowd wasn’t pleased. Nevertheless, Die, My Love earned more in its opening weekend than the entire domestic runs of Ramsay’s previous efforts, You Were Never Really Here and We Need To Talk About Kevin. If only Mubi hadn’t paid $24 million to distribute the movie, things wouldn’t seem so dire. Lesson here: If you want your film to open big and hold, cast “Mr. October” Mason Thames.
Here’s the full top 10:
- 1) Predator: Badlands ($40 million)
- 2) Regretting You ($7.125 million)
- 3) Black Phone 2($5.3 million)
- 4) Sarah’s Oil ($4.45 million)
- 5) Nuremberg ($4 million)
- 6) Chainsaw Man($3.6 million)
- 7) Bugonia ($3.5 million)
- 8) Die, My Love ($2.83 million)
- 9) Springsteen: Deliver Me From Nowhere ($2.2 million)
- 10) Tron: Ares ($1.8 million)
