Box Office Round-up
Ramayana: Rise Of A Legend is the biggest Indian production of all-time and it opened in the top spot with £2.2m, which includes £436k from Thursday previews. The Friday to Sunday total of £1.7m is the biggest Friday to Sunday total for a South Asian release of all-time, ahead of March’s Dhurandhar: The Revenge, which also opened with £1.7m (but slightly below Ramayana). Dhurandhar: The Revenge finished its run with £4.5m, which makes it the biggest South Asian release of all-time, so that’s the target for Ramayana: Rise of a Legend.
Wild Horse Nine opened in second with £1.5m, which includes £460k from previews. Martin McDonagh’s previous film, The Banshees Of Inisherin, opened with £1.6m in October 2022 and finished its run with £10m, so hopefully Wild Horse Nine can show similar staying power, although the schedule is packed in the coming weeks.
Godzilla Minus Zero opened in third with £1.4m, which includes £259k from previews. Godzilla Minus One, the film prior to this one, opened in December 2023 with £815k and finished its run with £2.7m, so Godzilla Minus Zero looks like comfortably topping that.
Wicker topped the box office last weekend but with a crowded release schedule it fell to fourth this weekend, despite posting a decent hold. It added £1.1m, which is down just 32% from last weekend. That takes its total after 10 days in cinemas to £4.3m. Olivia Colman starred in Wicked Little Letters, which opened with £1.6m in 2024 and showed terrific legs to get to £9.6m. We’re in the middle of a busy period for releases so that might be out of reach for Wicker, but it’s still a strong performance.
George Michael: The Faith Tour made it four new entries in the top five, opening with £1m. Earlier this year concert film, Billie Eilish: Hit Me Hard And Soft – The Tour grossed £2.1m from a short run in cinemas, so that’s a decent target for George Michael
Outside of the top five, I Play Rocky is in limited release at the moment, which was enough to gross £608k over the weekend (which includes £42k from previews). It expands to further screens from Wednesday of this week so should have a better weekend next weekend.
K-Pop is back in the top 10 as Stray Kids World Tour 'RUN IT' LIVE VIEWING banked an impressive £595k over the weekend, which was enough for 10th place.
Next Weekend
Prima Facie stars Cynthia Erivo in the big screen adaptation of the hugely popular one-woman play. Erivo plays Tessa, an ambitious defence lawyer. She expertly represents her clients, including those who are accused of sexual assault. However, she finds out that the law does not provide justice after being raped by a coworker.
How To Rob A Bank is an action-thriller starring Nicholas Hoult, Zoë Kravitz, and John C. Reilly. It’s about a team of bank robbers who are posting their heists on social media, causing police to chase them.
Fjord is the Palme d’Or winning drama about an immigrant Romanian family living in Norway that is subject to an investigation and faces the scrutiny of the local judicial system. Renate Reinsve and Sebastian Stan star.
Ebenezer is a new adaptation of Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol. Johnny Depp plays Ebenezer Scrooge who is visited by three ghosts in an attempt to teach him a valuable lesson. Sir Ian McKellen and Andrea Riseborough co-star.
The Buzz
Karoshi is an action-thriller about an ambitious exec who faces pressure to fill a position after a tragic accident. But as she interviews the new candidate, she realizes something amiss. The cast includes Takehiro Hira, Teo Yoo, Cynthia Erivo, Giancarlo Esposito and Isabel May. It looks stylish and action-packed, very much in the vein of the John Wick series. It looks ideal for any brands looking to reach 16-34 men in Q1 when it hits cinemas on 5 February
Across The Pond
Godzilla Minus Zero topped the box office in North America, opening with a terrific $31.6m, which is a huge increase on the $11.5m Godzilla Minus One opened with in November 2023. The Cat In The Hat opened in second with $20.5m and Drummer Boy opened in third with $9.3m. You Can See Everything posted a terrific hold in fourth, falling 23% to $8.9m for a new total of $79.8m. Ramayana rounded out the top five, opening with $8.7m.
