Weekend Estimates: Tenet Debuts to $20.2 Million Domestically, Heads to $150 Million Worldwide

September 6, 2020

Tenet

On an historic weekend for the movie industry, the two biggest releases of the year so far are going head-to-head in a battle to win over audiences using very different strategies. Tenet is making its debut in theaters domestically, after posting a very respectable $53 million internationally last weekend. Mulan, meanwhile, is making its debut as a Premium VOD release on Disney+ where the streaming service is available, and in theaters in other markets.

Warner Bros. is reporting $20.2 million from 2,810 locations domestically for Tenet “through the Labor Day holiday weekend” (which presumably means including previews and projected grosses for Sunday and Monday), and another $58.3 million internationally, for an international total of $126 million and a global cume of $146.2 million so far.

Disney is claiming a strong opening for Mulan in a handful of small international markets, with $5.9 million for the weekend. The real action for that movie is online, of course, for which no figures have been reported, or are expected.

Here are the details to date.

Warner Bros. is expressing satisfaction with its domestic debut, and lauds its partners in exhibition for their efforts to provide a safe return to theaters. They cite premium formats—IMAX, 70MM, and Dolby—as being particularly sought out by moviegoers. The film’s opening sets a new benchmark against which releases will be measured going forwards, and it gives us a couple of key figures to use in models: its opening is about 40% of what one usually expect for a Christopher Nolan film, and around 68% of the domestic market is currently open (per Disney this morning). As a rule of thumb, that means about 60% of regular moviegoers are inclined to go to theaters right now, which is actually not a bad figure.

On top of its $20.2 million domestic debut, Tenet will earn about $30 million in China this weekend—a record for a Christopher Nolan film in the territory, and biggest IMAX opening of 2020 there. It’ll pick up $2.9 million in Germany, for $8.7 million so far; $2.84 million in the UK, for $13.1 million; $2.79 million in France, for $10.7 million total; and open with $2.6 million in Russia.

Other cumes to date for Tenet: $8.2 million in Korea, $6.3 million in Taiwan, $5.2 million in Spain, $4.52 million in Australia, $4.51 million in Italy, and $4.1 million in the Netherlands. It’ll open in Hong Kong, Israel, and Qatar next weekend, and Japan and Mexico the weekend after.

Mulan opened number one in the UAE, second in Saudi Arabia, and will earn about $1.8 million in the Middle East as a whole this weekend. It’s running 31% ahead of Tenet in the UAE, and 18% behind Tenet in Saudi Arabia. Those territories have capacity restrictions between 30% and 50%.

In Asian markets, which are less restricted, Mulan opened in second place in Taiwan with $1.2 million; top in Thailand with $1.2 million; top in Singapore with $700,000; and top in Malaysia with $600,000. In spite of relatively light restrictions (over 90% of theaters are open in all these countries, and Taiwan has no restrictions at all), box office is generally soft: while Taiwan’s box office is up 41% from this weekend last year, Thailand is down 23%, Singapore is down 35%, and Malaysia is down a whopping 75%.

The big test for Mulan will come next weekend when it debuts in China. The figures for the movie from Taiwan are not entirely promising, as the film isn’t in the top 100 openings of all time in the market (the best figure ever for Taiwan is Avengers: Endgame’s $12.8 million last year). The best point of comparison is probably Wonder Woman, which opened with $1.3 million in Taiwan, and $38 million in China. That kind of number in China for Mulan would be very disappointing.

Mulan will also be opening in Russia, Greece, Hungary, Israel, Slovenia, Ukraine, Poland, and South Africa next weekend.

The New Mutants fell 59% from last weekend to $2.87 million domestically, for $11.6 million to date. It’s expected to earn $3.5 million over the long weekend. Those numbers are in line with expectations.

Mutants is now playing in 30 international territories, and will earn $4.2 million this weekend, for $8.5 million to date. Its numbers are, as expected, uniformly modest. It’ll pick up about $500,000 in the UK, well behind Tenet; $500,000 in Mexico (and place #1); $400,000 in Australia (finishing second to Tenet); and $400,000 in Russia, again behind Tenet. It’ll be 3rd in Italy, with around $300,000. In short, and unsurprisingly, it’s losing head-to-head battles with Tenet everywhere the two films are playing.

Filed under: Weekend Estimates, The New Mutants, Tenet