'Avatar' adds to cash pile, but 'M3GAN' is latest horror surprise
Avatar: The Way of Water (NYSE:DIS) charged on with its fourth weekend to reach No. 7 on the all-time worldwide box-office chart, but it was another modestly budgeted horror film that really got the movie-ticket sales year off to a good start.
The Avatar sequel (a follow-up to the all-time global leader) dropped just 33% of its third-weekend business to land at $45M domestically, and crossed the half-billion total there to reach a cumulative sum of $516.8M - a total that makes it the second-highest grosser of films released in 2022, behind only Top Gun: Maverick (PARA) (PARAA). That cumulative figure is the 16th highest domestic total of all time.
But with an international overall take of $1.19B, its worldwide total has reached $1.7B, meaning Avatar: The Way of Water surpassed Jurassic World as the seventh-highest global grosser. Next up on the list is No. 6, Spider-Man: No Way Home, with a global total of $1.92B.
And its closest weekend rival in North America was robot-companion horror film M3GAN (NASDAQ:CMCSA), which opened to $30.2M and kept up a recent trend of inexpensive horror films quickly moving to profitability (see also: Smile from Paramount (PARA) (PARAA) or The Black Phone (CMCSA), though M3GAN's opening is better than both of theirs).
M3GAN added another $14.8M overseas to hit $45M worldwide.
Third place on the domestic list went to Puss in Boots: The Last Wish (CMCSA), keeping up a steady string of double-digit finishes with $13.1M.
Cinema tickers: AMC Entertainment (AMC); Cineworld (OTCPK:CNNWQ); Cinemark (CNK); (IMAX); Marcus (MCS); Reading International (RDI); Cineplex (CGX:CA); National CineMedia (NCMI).