Battle at the Box Office 4/10/23
The Super Mario Bros. Movie dominated the Easter holiday box office, putting up the biggest opening of 2023 and shattering a number of previous records.
Super Mario Bros. took in $146.3 million for the regular 3-day weekend and $204.6 million total, as the movie opened on Wednesday last week. Worldwide, the movie made $377.6 million. That is the biggest global opening for an animated movie ever, pushing out Frozen 2 as the biggest opener. It was also the biggest opening ever for a movie based on a video game, topping Sonic the Hedgehog 2, and the biggest 5-day opening ever, topping Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen. It was also the third-best opening ever for an Easter weekend, behind Furious 7 and Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, and the fourth-biggest opening of all time for April behind Avengers: Endgame, Infinity War, and Furious 7. Finally, it was the fourth biggest opening ever for a PG/G-rated movie, behind 2019’s The Lion King, Incredibles 2, and Beauty and the Beast. Word of mouth will most likely remain strong as it got an A CinemaScore from audiences and there is basically no major competition in the realm of family animated movies until at least May, so Super Mario Bros. could continue to absolutely dominate in the next few weeks.
John Wick Chapter 4 remained in second place with $14.6 million, just barely fending off the three-day total of new release Air. John Wick Chapter 4 dropped 48% from last weekend and now has $147 million domestically and $268.9 million worldwide. It is still behind John Wick Chapter 3 but is outpacing it day for day and seems like it could top it at least domestically and probably worldwide, as it’s only $59 million away from Parabellum’s worldwide gross.
Air opened in third place with $14.4 million and $20.2 million total domestically for the five days of release. The movie took in $30.4 million worldwide. It was the third-best opening for Ben Affleck as a director, behind The Town and Argo, and sits between Smokin’ Aces and State of Play for his acting openings. For Matt Damon, the opening of Air was between The Brothers Grimm and Green Zone. For biopics, Air opened between Ali and House of Gucci.
Dungeons and Dragons: Honor Among Thieves and Scream VI rounded out the top 5, with the latter dropping a fairly steep 63% from last weekend’s #1 opening and taking in another $13.8 million, bringing it to $61.6 million domestically and $123.4 million worldwide.
Further down the list, Owen Wilson’s Paint just made it into the top 10 in limited release, making $570,512 in 819 theaters.
The Per Theater average went to The Super Mario Bros. Movie, which made $33,701 in each of the 4,343 theaters is it was playing in over the weekend.