FRIDAY MIDDAY UPDATE: Mr. Zaslav, I’d like to direct your attention over to the motion picture executive suite where co-chiefs Michael De Luca and Pam Abdy have an absolute, jaw-dropping hit on their hands in Legendary‘s A Minecraft Movie. Let the record show.
Today is $50M alone, and that includes last night’s near-$11M in previews. The weekend is well north of $100M at 4,263 theaters, with some rivals seeing $130M+. It’s clearly the biggest opening YTD on a 3-day basis ahead of Captain America: Brave New World‘s $88.8M. That also means it will be the biggest weekend of 2025 YTD for all movies, outstripping the $154M sum from February 14-16.
BTW, Warner Bros President of Production Jesse Ehrman also gets props here for Minecraft; he’s been with the project since the Toby Emmerich administration. De Luca and Abdy get big credit for actually greenlighting the current project as is. Also, Legendary gets a big shout-out for making this precious fan project a reality on the big screen.
The overindexing on Thursday night had to do with great late-night business. Warners also is precision-targeting audiences on digital in regards to ticket promotions — a practice that’s doable in this day and age for motion picture studios when the social media metrics team and distribution analytics teams meet. Warners has a strength with this marketing practice, having executed it on The Meg and Crazy Rich Asians, both of which overindexed. A Minecraft Movie is playing coast to coast.
This is great news after a CinemaCon where all the studios, including streamer Amazon MGM Studios, presented their best wares — not just with trailers and stars but with concert performances from The Weeknd (Lionsgate) and a 43-piece orchestra (Universal). It’s clear that everyone still believes in moviegoing despite the sucky quarter, and they’re not turning their backs on their commitment to the theatrical experience. Better days are ahead.
Rest of box office Top 5 is as follows
2.) The Chosen: Last Supper – Part 2 (Fath) 2,313 theaters, Fri $3M, 3-day $7.2M/Wk 1
3.) A Working Man (AMZ MGM) 3,262 theaters, Fri $1.9M, 3-day $6.8M (-56%), Total $27.3M/Wk 2
4.) Snow White (Dis) 3,750 theaters, Fri $1.4M, 3-day $5.7M (-60%), Total $77M/Wk 3
5.) The Woman in the Yard (Uni) 2,845 theaters, Fri $1.1M, 3-day $3.7M (-61%), Total $15.8M/Wk 2
UPDATED after Thursday night exclusive: We told you that Warner Bros/Legendary’s A Minecraft Movie was booming and here it is with $10.55 million in previews. That exceeds the $10.3M start for Blumhouse/Universal’s Five Nights at Freddy’s, making it the all-time preview record for a movie based on a video game (reminder: 2023’s The Super Mario Bros Movie from Illumination/Universal/Nintendo did not have previews because it opened on a Wednesday).
Freddy’s had close to a $40M first day for its October 2023 bow, on its way to an $80M opening weekend. We’ll see how this plays out for A Minecraft Movie, but clearly an $80M+ weekend is in store, if not more.
Social media analytics corp RelishMix is over the moon about the pre-release buzz, saying that with a 772 millon social media universe, the Jared Hess-directed Minecraft is exceeding family live-action genre norms by 2.4x across TikTok, Facebook, X, YouTube and Instagram combined. It also outstrips the social media reach of Paramount’s Sonic the Hedgehog 3 (530M) by 46%. That also includes a robust social network for the game at 94.1M. Big social media stars here with Jack Black’s 32.7M fans, Jason Momoa’s 20.1M count, and Emma Myers at 9.8M.
Very high recommend scores from the fan crowd last night on Screen Engine/Comscore’s PostTrak for A Minecraft Movie, with overall audiences giving it 63%, kids under 12 65% and 5 stars (they’ll nag their parents to go), and 67% recommend from parents and 4 1/2 stars. Last night’s demos were 35% kids/parents and 65% general. Demos were 42% guys under 25, 23% women under 25, 17% men over 25, and 11% women over 25. The difference so far is that Freddy‘s had more under-25s than Minecraft Movie, 80%-72%, but we can’t deny the momentum from Gen Z here.
Among positive word of mouth for Minecraft per RelishMix: “‘This looks just like how Minecraft should look, so excited for this.’ Fans are comping strong titles, “We got a Five Nights at Freddy’s, now A Minecraft Movie.’”
(L-R) Billy Bryk and Finn Wolfhard in ‘Hell of a Summer‘
Neon
The other notable wide entry this frame, Neon’s Hell of a Summer, did $215,000 from previews that began at 7 p.m. A $1M take is the outlook for this one, co-written, co-directed and co-starring Finn Wolfhard and Billy Bryk. Critics aren’t impressed at 58% on Rotten Tomatoes, with 3 stars in last night’s PostTrak exits and a 43% recommend from those who watched it. Mostly Wolfhard fans here with 55% female, and 50-50 split in the under/over 25 bunch.
PREVIOUS EXCLUSIVE, Thursday PM: “Presales just suddenly popped this week,” an exhibitor remarked Thursday at CinemaCon about the potential mushrooming forecast for Warner Bros/Legendary’s A Minecraft Movie.
Get excited. At a time when the domestic box office this year is 11% behind 2024, and on a day when President Donald Trump has just turned the economy upside down with global tariffs, the Burbank, CA lot is looking at a big hit this weekend in A Minecraft Movie. Previews tonight per sources are around $7 million+ after starting at 3 p.m. Conservative projections have risen to $75M+, but everyone is talking crazy forecasts right now because it’s been so long since the industry had a box office hit. Only one weekend to date in 2025 exceeded $100M for all titles: February 14-16 ($144M), which was when Captain America: Brave New World posted a $88.8M 3-day and $100M 4-day frame.
At its current level in regards to previews, the movie directed by Jared Hess and starring Jason Momoa, Jack Black, Danielle Brooks and Jennifer Coolidge is higher than all previous Sonic the Hedgehog movies (Sonic 1 was $3M, Sonic 2 was $5M and Sonic 3 was $6.5M). Sonic the Hedgehog 3‘s previews repped 26% of its $25.4M Friday, which turned into a $60.1M opening, but that was leading into Christmas.
A Minecraft Movie‘s previews are currently under the $10.3M of Universal/Blumhouse’s Five Nights at Freddy’s from October 2023. That figured repped 26% of its first Friday, that being $39.6M, which turned into an $80M opening. Working in Minecraft Movie‘s favor is its massive fanbase: the Mojang Studios title counts 300 million copies sold and nearly 140M monthly active players. It’s a video game loved by generations ala Super Mario Bros (which didn’t have previews) and Five Nights at Freddy’s.
Reviews for A Minecraft Movie stand at 51% Rotten, but this fan-fave feature take of a video game is critic-proof. Five Nights at Freddy’s was 32% Rotten with critics and 86% on the popcorn meter with an A- CinemaScore.
Warner Bros didn’t return request for comment regarding our forecasts tonight.