Critics lambasted it, and audiences didn't rate it much higher. Despite the headwinds, Mel Gibson's Flight Risk managed to open No. 1 at the box office with a modest $12 million debut, according to studio estimates Sunday. On a quiet weekend, even for the typically frigid moviegoing month of January, the top spot went to the Lionsgate thriller starring Mark Wahlberg as a pilot flying an air marshal (Michelle Dockery) and fugitive (Topher Grace) across Alaska. But it wasn't a particularly triumphant result for Gibson's directorial follow-up to 2016's Hacksaw Ridge. Reviews (21% fresh on Rotten Tomatoes) and audience scores (a "C" CinemaScore) were dismal, the AP reports.
The weekend's most daring gambit was A24 pushing Brady Corbet's The Brutalist, a 3½-hour epic nominated for 10 Academy Awards, into wide release. Though some executives initially greeted the film, which is running with an intermission, as "un-distributable," Corbet has said, A24 acquired the film out of the Venice Film Festival, and it's managed solid business, collecting $6 million in limited release. In wide release, it earned $2.9 million—far from blockbuster but the best weekend yet for The Brutalist. Coming off one of the lowest Martin Luther King Jr. holiday weekends in years, no new releases made a major impact.
Below are estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at US and Canadian theaters, according to Comscore. Final domestic figures will be released Monday.
- Flight Risk, $12 million.
- Mufasa: The Lion King, $8.7 million.
- One of Them Days, $8 million.
- Sonic the Hedgehog 3, $5.5 million.
- Moana 2, $4.3 million.
- Presence, $3.4 million.
- Wolf Man, $3.4 million.
- A Complete Unknown, $3.1 million.
- Den of Thieves 2: Pantera, $3 million.
- The Brutalist, $2.9 million.
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