‘Elvis’ Earns $3.5 Million Thursday, ‘Black Phone’ Nabs $3 Million

In what could be a weekend that affirms that theatrical moviegoing need not be entirely dominated by tentpoles (even as a month-old blockbuster threatens to retake the top slot), Warner Bros.’ very good Elvis and Universal’s very good The Black Phone both nabbed promising Thursday debuts in advance of their opening weekends. We could, emphasis on “could” see the first weekend since July of 2016 where five films gross more than $20 million. Of course, most of those films (Star Trek Beyond, Ghostbusters and Ice Ace: Continental Drift) were big-budget bombs or comparative disappointments, but I digress.

Even if only four of these films (including Top Gun: Maverick, Jurassic World Dominion and Lightyear) crack $20 million, we haven’t had four $20 million grossers in a single weekend since Thanksgiving weekend 2018 (Ralph Breaks the Internet, Creed II, The Grinch and Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald). Anyway, Warner Bros.’ Elvis began its domestic run yesterday with $3.5 million in previews, including both early Thursday showings and week-of sneak previews. The well-reviewed Baz Luhrmann-directed Elvis Presley biopic is hoping to pull in the kind of older and/or irregular moviegoers who have been flocking (along with everyone else) to Top Gun: Maverick.

With plenty of positive media for Austin Butler (a comparative newbie to most people even if he has 15 years of Disney Channel/Nickelodeon experience under his belt) and Tom Hanks playing way against type (he usually plays real-life American heroes, not real-life American scoundrels), this could be another example of Warner Bros. doing what it does best, namely turning comparatively unconventional tentpoles (Inception, Gravity, The LEGO Movie, American Sniper, It, Crazy Rich Asians, A Star Is Born, Joker, Dune, etc.) into full-fledged theatrical smash hits.

We are days away from the tenth anniversary of Steven Soderbergh’s Magic Mike, an R-rated Channing Tatum male stripper dramady that WB opened to $39 million alongside Universal’s $54 million opening for Seth MacFarlane and Mark Wahlberg’s acclaimed and buzzy Ted. I was so optimistic a decade ago, as both (relatively good and well-liked) films showed the potential for the return of the responsibility-budgeted, R-rated grown-up movie (see also: Prometheus clearing $400 million on a $130 million budget) thriving right alongside the likes of The Avengers, Brave and Men in Black III.

We could see an opening weekend closer to $35 million than $30 million. That would be a massive win for WB as it’s essentially (unless DC League of Super-Pets seriously overperforms) the Dream Factory’s only big summer release. Let’s split the difference and hope for $35 million. That said, even if it’s comparatively frontloaded, even a $25 million-plus debut (Dune debuted with $40 million from a $5.1 million Thursday gross) would be solid for the $85 million musical biopic. It (along with Top Gun 2) is essentially the only big grown-up movie of the season.

Speaking of Universal, Blumhouse’s (justly) acclaimed The Black Phone earned $3 million on Thursday. That’s a strong launch for an R-rated, new-to-you adaptation (it’s based on a Joe Hill short story but I imagine most moviegoers will treat it as an “original”) and is a bigger preview number than M. Night Shyamalan’s Split ($2 million), Jordan Peele’s Get Out ($1.8 million) and Happy Death Day ($1 million), Blumhouse’s 2017 triple whammy which went on to open with (respectively) $40 million, $33 million and $26 million.

I don’t want to get too carried away here, but a $3 million Thursday gross is just under The Conjuring ($3.3 million in 2013) and The Conjuring 2 ($3.4 million in 2016), both of which went on to earn $40 million-plus debuts. Once upon a time, even Blumhouse’s first The Purge nabbed $3.4 million in Thursday previews and broke a record for an R-rated horror original with a $33 million debut. I’m not trying to get carried away, but in a non-Covid/non-streaming world, I’d be almost certain that $25 million would be a “pessimistic” result for this sure-to-be-buzzy chiller.

The reviews are terrific, the buzz is strong and I’d imagine word of mouth is going to be very strong both because the Mason Thames/Madeleine McGraw/Ethan Hawke/Jeremy Davies child abduction chiller is very good and because (relatively speaking and without spoiling anything) it’s more crowd-pleasing than (for example) Hereditary or The Empty Man. The Scott Derrickson-directed flick, penned by Derrickson and C. Robert Cargill, cost around $19 million, so even a $15-$20 million launch would be a relative win (especially as I’d expect legs). I can’t even remember the last time we had a weekend with five $25 million-plus grossers, but…