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Early morning estimates show Disney’s Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker crossing the $400 million mark stateside with $407.8M after a New Year’s Day of $17.2M. That take bests the New Year’s Day cash of The Last Jedi ($14.2M), and isn’t that far from Rogue One‘s New Year’s Day of $16.75M. Skywalker‘s money is also, of course, far from what Force Awakens made on Jan. 1 , 2016 ($34.3M).
In regards to its running cume, Skywalker went from being 2% behind Last Jedi on Sunday to being 8% behind in its first 13 days. Part of that reason stems from big box office days like Christmas and New Year’s falling later in Last Jedi‘s run. By its 16th day of release, on Dec. 30, Last Jedi, flew past the half billion mark at the domestic box office. With Skywalker coming off a higher Christmas than Last Jedi, $32.1M to $27.4M, box office sources aggressively projected last weekend the ninth-quel taking over the eigth-quel in its running total. That didn’t happen. Last Jedi finaled its U.S./Canada run at $620.1M.
In spots 2 and 3 yesterday, Sony’s Jumani: The Next Level and Little Women respectively made $10.9M and $5.25M. Next Level plants itself at $203M in its 20th day of release, which is 18% behind Welcome to the Jungle at the same point in time, that movie finaling at $404.5M. Through eight days, Little Women stands at $42.8M.
The Culver City lot looks to expand its counter-programming footprint this weekend with Screen Gems’ second reboot of Japanese horror franchise The Grudge from Sundance wunderkind Nicholas Pesce, director of The Eyes of My Mother and Piercing. Sam Raimi produces. The studio is spotting a $9M start for Grudge which one report says cost $10M before P&A, however, other tracking reports see the movie potentially doing between $11M-$15M at 2,642 locations. Andrea Riseborough and Demian Bichir star. In recent days, Grudge made gains among younger females, followed by younger males, though keep in mind the R-rating here might keep some of them away. Previews start tonight at 7PM at 2,393 theaters. No RT score yet on The Grudge as press screenings are today. Horror has been very successful at playing to New Year’s audiences and last year Sony found a cash cow in the PG-13 The Escape Room, which off a $9M production cost opened to $18.2M stateside, finaling at $57M domestic, $155.7M global. Escape Room 2 opens on Aug. 14. The first two U.S. made Grudges grossed together close to $258M WW for Sony.
The Safdie Brothers’ Uncut Gems is the gift that keeps on giving to A24 with the pic in its 9th day of wide release making $3.1M for a running total of $27.3M. By today, Uncut Gems will pass Midsommar ($27.4M) as A24’s fourth highest grossing pic stateside after Lady Bird ($48.9M), Hereditary ($44M) and Moonlight ($27.9M). That’s the fifth day of the Adam Sandler’ pic’s nine wide days that it has grossed over $3M in a single day, Christmas being its highest with $5.9M.