EXCLUSIVE: A non-franchise movie is making waves at the box office and we’re talking about Amazon MGM Studios‘ Project Hail Mary.
Sources tell us that the previews for the Phil Lord-Christopher Miller directed sci-fi production are north of $11M, which takes us to an upper stratosphere that’s ahead of another non-franchise movie, Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer ($10.5M). It’s also ahead of all the comps for original pics that many tracking services were pegging it to: F1 ($10M previews), Sinners ($4.7M) and Weapons ($5.7M). Project Hail Mary is based on Andy Weir’s 2021 New York Times bestseller.
In terms of the previews rollout, Amazon MGM Studios had twenty-nine 70M shows last weekend (single shows on Friday, Saturday and Sunday), followed by Prime member screenings on Monday in PLFs and Imax, as well as tonight’s shows.
Before we bury the lede even further, by golly, it’s the best previews so far in 2026, ahead of Scream 7‘s $7.8M ($63.6M opening). Tracking in recent days raised the weekend forecast to north of $60M. Let’s not be over-bullish just yet, because the opening range between F1 and Oppenheimer was $57M-$82.4M. We’re also hearing the Amy Pascal, Ryan Gosling, Rachel O’Connor, Andy Weir and Aditya Sood production landed five stars on tonight’s PostTrak.
In addition, Project Hail Mary reps the best previews ever for an Amazon MGM Studios release, ahead of Creed III ($5.4M, which turned in a 3-day of $58.3M, best domestic start ever for the shopping site-streamer-theatrical embracer). It’s also arguably the second-best previews ever for a Gosling movie behind Barbie ($22.3M).
The best opening for a non-franchise movie belongs to Oppenheimer ($82.4M) followed by I Am Legend ($77.2M; like Project Hail Mary it was based on a novel).
Talk to anybody in distribution, and the exclamation is “this is good for the business,” read a non-franchise title breaking out and finding a mass audience.