Try Again, Glen Powell

Glen Powell’s The Running Man is not performing well. The $110 million budgeted film opened with a soft $16 million in its first weekend and sank to only $6 million in its second weekend. It’s amassed only $48 million. I wouldn’t read too much into it. There wasn’t a lot of interest in The Running Man IP and, to be honest, the film itself was kind of underwhelming. Paramount, under David Ellison, also didn’t put a lot of marketing muscle behind it.

Powell opened Twisters and Anyone But You to huge numbers, but it’s hard to tell yet if he can power a film by himself. He has plenty more opportunities, including JJ Abrams’ next flick, Ghostwriter, in which he will star opposite Jenna Ortega, a Ron Howard firefighter film, a Judd Apatow project, and a Barry Jenkins movie to which he’s attached.

His next out, however, is an A24 film that’s more in line with his phenomenal Linklater film for Netflix, Hitman. In How to Make a Killing, Powell is a guy who is 9th in line for a billion dollar inheritance. All he has to do is remove the “rich pr*cks” in the line of succession before him, among them Topher Grace, who plays rich pr*ck better than anyone (see The Waterfront, a show I’m convinced was cancelled because they killed off Topher’s character).

Here’s the trailer. It looks intriguing.

There’s a good supporting cast here, too, including Margaret Qualley, Jessica Henwick, Ed Harris, Bill Camp, Zach Woods, and Raff Law (son of Jude). It comes from director John Patton Ford, who gifted us with the incredible Aubrey Plaza starrer, Emily the Criminal.

How to Make a Killing hits theaters in February.