| Date | |
|---|---|
| Author | Mia Blakeney |
Box Office Round-up
Avatar: Fire And Ash is the third film in the sci-fi series and it’s the third film to top the UK box office on the weekend before Christmas. It opened with £9m, which is the fifth highest opening weekend of the year, just behind Jurassic World: Rebirth’s £9.1m opening. The previous film, Avatar: The Way Of Water, opened with £11.1m, and the first film opened with £6.7m. If it’s anything like the previous two films it will see an exceptionally strong hold next weekend.
Zootropolis 2 fell to second, adding £1.9m, which is down 32% from last weekend. That takes its total to a punchy £18.6m and it is the eleventh biggest film of 2025 and the biggest animated film of 2025, having overtaken The Bad Guys 2 (£14.6m). With the Christmas holidays ahead, and no major family release until February (apart from Spongebob), it is heading to £30m.
Wicked: For Good came in third, adding £1.1m which is down 42% from last weekend. That takes its total to £42.8m and it’s the third biggest film of the year, and closing in on Bridget Jones: Mad About The Boy in second (£46.4m).
Dhurandhar is proving to be one of the year’s big South Asian hits. It came in fifth last weekend and this weekend it’s in fourth. It added £387k this weekend which takes its total to £2m and it’s now the second highest grossing South Asian release of the year, behind July’s Saiyaara (£3.2m).
Five Nights At Freddy’s 2 rounded out the top five, falling 63% to £373k. That takes its total after 17 days in cinemas to £6.2m. It’s already overtaken the current total of Blumhouse’s other recent horror sequel The Black Phone 2, which is up to £3.7m.
Outside of the top 10, there was a host of older Christmas themed films with Home Alone, The Polar Express and It’s A Wonderful Life performing the most strongly, adding £267k, £183k and £167k respectively.
Next Weekend
Anaconda is a comedy starring Jack Black and Paul Rudd. A group of friends are going through a mid-life crisis. They decide to remake a favourite movie from their youth but encounter unexpected events when they enter the jungle.
Sentimental Value is the latest film from Joachim Trier (The Worst Person In The World). It’s an intimate exploration of family, memories, and the reconciliatory power of art, starring Renate Reinsve, Stellan Skarsgård, Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas and Elle Fanning. It opens on limited release on Boxing Day and then goes wider on New Year’s Day.
Marty Supreme stars Timothee Chalamet as Marty Mauser, a young man with a dream no one respects, goes to hell and back in pursuit of greatness. It opens on limited release on Boxing Day and then goes wider on New Year’s Day.
The Buzz
The Sheep Detectives is an adaptation of Leonie Swan’s best-selling novel, Three Bags Full: A Sheep Detective Novel. Every night a shepherd reads aloud a murder mystery, pretending his sheep can understand. When he is found dead, the sheep realize at once that it was a murder and think they know everything about how to go about solving it. The film is written by Craig Mazin, who recently has found huge success on television writing and producing Chernobyl and The Last Of Us, so he probably wanted to work on something a bit more light-hearted. The excellent cast includes Hugh Jackman, Emma Thompson, Regina Hall, Bryan Cranston, and Bella Ramsey, and whilst it looks ideal for the half-term audience, it also looks like it could perform strongly with older fans of films like The Thursday Murder Club.
Across The Pond
Avatar: Fire And Ash topped the box office in North America too, opening with $88m. Religious-themed animation David opened in second with $22m, and The Housemaid opened in third with $19m. The Spongebob Movie: Search For Squarepants opened in fourth with $16m and Zootopia 2 rounded out the top five, adding $15.5m for a new total of $282.8m.