The animated adaptation of the video game, which attracts families this long Easter weekend, breaks several attendance records.
Super Mario Bros, the movies exceeds all of Universal’s expectations and shatters the cursed glass ceiling of game adaptations. Nintendo racked up $146 million in U.S. box office receipts for its first weekend in theaters. Almost double the estimates of experts who were counting on 86 million dollars.
Far from having been weakened by the murderous critics who deplored the ugliness of the design or the simplicity of the plot, the feature film which sees Mario and his brother Luigi face the dreadful Bowser in the Mushroom Kingdom is full of all generations confused. Both that of the 50s and 40s who had played the game and are nostalgic for it, as well as the families. Many parents brought very young children to the screening for this extended Easter weekend.
Super Mario Bros, the movies breaks several records: best start for the first opus of an animated film, and best start of the year altogether. Far ahead of the previous title holder Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania and its $106 million. The figures for the cartoon are just as excellent internationally with 173 million receipts. In France, the film even paid for the luxury of exceeding for its first 24 hours of exploitation The three Musketeers by Martin Bourboulon.
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The plumber in dungarees and a distance mustache is the fourth part of the saga John Wick, in which Keanu Reeves reprises his role as a hitman fighting an international crime group. Released for three weeks, the thriller lands in second place in the rankings with 14.6 million dollars collected.
In third place is the big-budget action movie Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Thieves which held the head of the box office last week. The highly anticipated adaptation of the most popular role-playing game, starring Chris Pine, Michelle Rodriguez, Hugh Grant and the star of the series Bridgerton Regé-Jean Page, made $14.5 million. That’s a drop of more than 60%.
Air of Ben Affleck takes advantage of the call of air
Ben Affleck’s latest movie, Air, which chronicles the origins of Nike shoes taken from NBA legend Michael Jordan, lands fourth with $14.4 million. A very encouraging score, again higher than expected: Air benefited from the call for air from Super Mario Bros, the movies and jam-packed movie theaters. Produced by the Amazon Prime platform, Air was distributed in theaters as part of the merchant site’s change of strategy. Like its competitor Apple TV+, Amazon now wants a traditional release for its most prestigious films. To reach viewers and keep the buzz going ahead of the awards season.
Finally, the sixth installment of the Scream saga with Courteney Cox and the star of the Wednesday series Jenna Ortega arrives at fifth place on the podium, with 3.3 million. This brings its total revenue to $103.8 million. Taking place Scream 6 is the first sequel to cross the symbolic bar of 100 million dollars since Scream 2 in 1997.