The Fall Guy, Universal’s romantic action comedy starring Ryan Gosling as a stunt man and Emily Blunt as a tentpole director, kicked off summer slightly below expectations on an estimated $28.5m to lead North American box office.
The film had been forecast to open in the low $30m range and Universal executives are looking at the long play and will hope it gathers momentum powered by word of mouth and an A- CinemaScore result.
Costing a reported $130m, it will need to pick up speed, just as director and former stuntman David Leitch’s previous film Bullet Train did after opening on $30m in August 2022 and going on to earn $103m.
Encouragingly, the Gosling and Blunt starrer, an ode to stunt performers that was inspired by the 1980s series of the same name starring Lee Majors, earned a further $25.4m from international markets to settle on $36.9m, and an early $65.4m worldwide.
Heading into the weekend box office trailed 2023 by the same stage by 21.9%. The Fall Guy marks the first non-Disney/Marvel tentpole to open the summer in some years and was way behind the $118.4m debut of Guardians Of The Galaxy Vol. 3 in the year-ago frame, although comparisons are somewhat specious given the films’ relative size and cost.
Disney’s re-release of Star Wars: The Phantom Menace celebrating May The Fourth weekend placed second on $8.1m, followed by Amazon MGM Studios’ Challengers in third place after a $7.6m gross in the second weekend for a $29.5m running total.
Sony’s genre title Tarot from Screen Gems arrived in fourth place on $6.5m, while Warner Bros’ Godzilla vs Kong: The New Empire rounded out the top five on $4.5m.
A24’s Civil War ranks fifth after four weekends on $62m and is on course to cross $100m worldwide on Monday.
The distributor scored another hit as Jane Schoenbrun’s phantasmagorical coming-of-age trans drama and Sundance and Berlin selection I Saw The TV Glow delivered one of the best specialty debuts of the year, opening on $116,300 in four venues for a $29,085 average.
Returning to the big picture, studios will need to deliver far more hits than misses over the summer if this year’s box office is to scrape past $4bn as it did last year when ‘Barbenheimer’ and Guardians excelled.
This summer’s upcoming crop includes Disney/Pixar’s Inside Out 2 on June 14, Universal/Illumination’s Despicable Me 4 on July 3 and Disney/Marvel’s Deadpool vs Wolverine on July 26. The latter was originally scheduled to open this weekend before the strikes delayed its release.
May 10 brings the debut of Disney/Fox’s Kingdom Of The Planet Of The Apes, followed a week later by Paramount’s family adventure IF from John Krasinski. Sony’s The Garfield Movie and Warner Bros’ Cannes selection Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga launch on Memorial Day Weekend, which traditionally marks the official launch of summer season.
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