Box Office Report: I Keep On Falling

The Fall Guy got really strong reviews. It stars a pair of Oscar nominees from two of the biggest films of 2023. It’s fun and easy to watch and appealing to mainstream audiences. And yet it still couldn’t win over the viewers it needed to in order to be a commercial hit.

With a reported budget of $130 million, The Fall Guy earned $28.5 million from just over 4,000 theatres. That was enough to get it to the number one spot but it isn’t good news given the movie’s cost. And it’s not even a massively budgeted movie by 2024 blockbuster standards. In the era where $250 million is now not that big a deal for a tentpole flick, The Fall Guy was positively thrifty. Were audiences just not into a reboot of an old TV show, even with Ken in the lead? If even IP works like this can’t get viewers’ butts into seats, what can?

Well, have you heard of this thing called Star Wars? It’s a whole thing. A lot of people are into it. The first episode, as in the first in the prequels trilogy, The Phantom Menace, just turned 25. Disney re-released it in 2,700 theatres and managed to earn an impressive $8.08 million. Not too shabby for a movie that was long considered pop culture’s greatest punching bag. Nostalgia is a hell of a drug, but also there’s a ton of stuff in that film that just begs to be seen on a huge screen.

At number four, behind Challengers, is the horror film Tarot with $6.5 million from 3,104 locations. Low-budget horror films are almost always a safe bet, as we’ve noted many times over the years.

A24’s Civil War has now made $62 million domestically, It’s made its $50 million budget back and has close to $94 million to its name worldwide. It’s a good step forward for A24 and their ongoing efforts to make more mainstream films outside of their indie cool appeal.

In limited release news: the trippy thriller I Saw the TV Glow grossed $116,340 from four theatres; Ethan and Maya Hawke’s Flannery O’Connor drama Wildcat earned $58,140 from three cinemas; and the Japanese drama Evil Does Not Exist — one of my favourite films of 2024 — made $45,300 from three places.

This coming week sees the release of Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes, Not Another Church Movie, and Lost Soulz.

You can check out the rest of the weekend box office here.