Avatar: The Way of Water continues to shatter records and overperform at the box office, notching top grosses for several weekdays, as previously discussed, people are determined to see this picture on the biggest and best screens possible and are checking it out whenever they can do so, not necessarily hitting the multiplexes just on weekends. Like last weekend, this was another holiday weekend — New Year — so it’s another four-day haul. The Way of Water has now surpassed Top Gun: Maverick as the highest-grossing movie of 2022 with a total of $1.37 billion worldwide.
The Way of Water grossed $86.3M, bringing its 18-day take to $444.4M, surpassing Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, which generated $440.9M in the same amount of time.
New Years’ weekends are typically better at the box office than Christmas weekends, but of course in 2022 (last weekend), a big chunk of the U.S. was hit by Winter Storm Elliott, causing massive theater closures and even bans on driving in some areas. So naturally, NY weekend had no choice but to perform better.
Puss in Boots: The Last Wish stayed in the #2 spot for a sophomore frame, earning $21.7M over four days. However, last weekend’s other big openers are not holding up well. Sony’s Whitney Houston biopic I Wanna Dance With Somebody dropped to #4 after a #3 debut. It earned an additional $5.4M. As mentioned last weekend, this film got weak critical reviews, but audiences love it. But it doesn’t seem that word of mouth is spreading.
Babylon, which has been a dud with both critics and viewers, dropped as expected to #5 taking in just $3.6M.
This allowed Black Panther: Wakanda Forever to climb back to #3 after dropping to #5 last weekend. Over four days, this MCU sequel earned $6.5M, bringing its running domestic total to $439.6M after two months in theaters. Things may drop off soon, however, as Disney has already announced that Wakanda Forever will hit Disney+ at the end of January.
Though not even close to the Top Five, Tom Hanks’ latest awards bait, A Man Called Otto had the highest per-screen average with $18.7K (for a total of $75K) in the four theaters in Los Angeles and New York where it opened.
You can check out the Top Five below:
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- Avatar: The Way of Water (Disney/20th Century Studios) – 3-day $63.4M / 4-day $82.4M/Total: $440.5M/ Wk 3
- Puss in Boots: The Last Wish (Universal) – 3-day $16.3M / 4-day $21.7M/Total $66.1M/Wk 2
- Black Panther: Wakanda Forever (Disney) – 3 day $4.83M /4-day $6.5M/Total $439.6M/Wk 8
- I Wanna Dance With Somebody (Sony) – 3-day $4.25M / 4-day $5.4M/Total $16MWk 2
- Babylon (Paramount) – 3-day $2.7M / 4-day $3.6M/Total $11M/Wk 2
Theaters are going into hibernation for the next month+. Are there any pictures you are looking forward to?
