First weekend of January 2026

Happy New Year everyone, this weekend should follow the same pattern we’ve been seeing over the last week or so for the holiday in relation to last year; we should be up 5% or something close to that. Even though we have a really light January (again) this year, last year was really really light and we should be a decent amount ahead of 2025 each week until we get to the last week of January, but even that week has a couple of titles that could surprise. So we should start the year with a surplus.

Because we only have one (semi) wide film this week, I thought I would go through the roster of films we have in theaters right now and break down what they faced in the marketplace, and by looking at those challenges, hopefully we can learn from them. Over the days since Christmas, the way these films have performed each day (because there’s a different demo skew to some days, such as the difference in consumers going to a movie on New Year’s Eve vs New Year’s Day) have to told us about what demos are showing up. When you look at the holiday period as a whole, you can see how interactive everything is, and when one film starts to tip, it comes out of another film. But looking at what happened back in 2014 (the last time Christmas was on Thursday) I would look at a 40% drop from last weekend as what a normal film would do, and if it’s better than that it’s showing us it will probably be around for a while.

Avatar: Fire and Ash - Looking at where this is before we go into the weekend (before the world starts back up), Fire and Ash is about $90 million behind where The Way of Water was at the same point, which is about a 25% deficit. But looking a little closer at the grosses, The Way of Water opened on the 16th and Fire and Ash opened on the 19th, so it had 3 more days before Christmas. The reason that’s important here is that those 3 days back in 2022 were without any real competition. This year, Fire and Ash had about $75 million of new title competitive gross during those days before Christmas, so that increase in choice for the movie going consumer makes that $90 million look about right; but as they used to say on late night TV infomercials ‘but wait, there’s more’. Back in 2022, the marketplace once the Christmas Day films opened were insanely light, just 3 films opened. Puss in Boots: The Last Wish, Babylon and Whitney Houston: I wanna Dance with Somebody combined for a mere $61 million from opening day through the Thursday before everyone goes back to work/school, and this year the 3 films that opened on Christmas Day have grossed $95 million through yesterday. So that shortfall of $95 million not only looks reasonable, but I’d argue that Disney probably did a better job here. In addition, there was probably a boost for The Way of Water because it had been 13 years since Avatar, and absence makes the heart grow fonder. Looking at all the factors that could determine if Avatar 4 happens, if you took the competitive landscape that The Way of Water had in 2022 and put it up against Fire and Ash in 2025, because of the lighter competitive landscape, that difference in competition would have made this an upward trend and we probably already would have seen news in the trades that Avatar 4 was full speed ahead. This looks a little light today and based on what I’m looking at now, this looks like a drop of about 45% this weekend for a 3 day in the mid 30’s. But as much as the increased competition makes the lower gross on Fire and Ash make sense, there’s one more tiny little detail that makes Fire and Ash look even better…..

Zootopia 2 - As much as we try to figure out all the angles of the competitive landscape when films get dated, you can’t account for a lightning strike, and that’s what happened here. And here’s the bottom line, when a 5 week old Thanksgiving film grosses more over the two weeks of the Christmas holiday, than any of the other films in the marketplace than Avatar, it’s just an act of god and there’s nothing you can do about it. And this particular act of god had a profound effect on a couple of the other films in the marketplace. This weekend is going to be very close to last weekend and might end up with a drop as slim as 15% for a gross in the high teens.

The Housemaid - There are two key pieces of data here; what it did the first two days of the run (Thursday and Friday) and what it did on Christmas Day. This had a really nice first two days driven by a ‘girls night out’ aspect, similar to what we saw on films like Magic Mike and Sex and the City. But this film was originally dated for a Christmas Day opening, which is usually the smart move for an Adult drama like this. But the Christmas Day gross was one of the lowest grossing days of the run so far on this film, so that group attendance factor that happened out of the gate, probably wouldn’t have happened had they stayed on Christmas Day (especially considering what it did on Christmas Day). So the bold move of going on a weekend that usually spells disaster for a film of this skew, it’s why it is where it is today. But there’s one more aspect of this film, Sydney Sweeney is doing her Sydney Sweeney thing on social media again. On Anything But You she started a trend based on the song playing over the end credits, and that started the film on a crazy trajectory at the box-office. Now it’s her fans posting how freaked out they are by the film, and it seems to be working and it’s been digging in over the last couple of days. What’s cool here is how that social media angle was in sync with Lionsgate’s chase campaign that essentially positiioned it as ’this film will fuck you up for life’. So there’s a lot of things coming together today and it’s showing up at the box-office. This looks down only about 20% from last weekend for a gross just short of the teens, but because January looks so light, there’s a really good chance that this film could be playing the $100 million game.

Marty Supreme - This film got off to the best start of the three Christmas Day films, and there were two things that were nice to hear around town. First, there was a lot of love for A24’s campaign for this movie and how it felt like they’ve grown up to be a viable big studio. Second, it seems as if this film tips Timothee Chalamet as a bankable box-office star, and when you’ve got someone who can not only deliver on an artistic level, but will also work his ass off in the marketing, it’s good for the sector. But there’s one aspect that’s beginning to show up today, it looks down about 45% for the weekend and (maybe it’s just what I’m seeing) it feels like the chase spend is a little light here. And since movies affect each other this time of year, The Housemaid’s surge might have something to do with this film looking a little flat today. With exits as good as this film has, it should be down 30% or 35% this weekend. But back to the positive. With a gross that looks about $10 million for the weeknd, this film will pass Uncut Gems as A24’s 3rd highest cume in their history this weekend. And then it should pass Civil War at some point (depending on what happens during the Awards cycle) over the next couple of weeks. I thought this would soar past Everything Everywhere All At Once to become A24’s highest grossing film in their history, but they’re really going to have to right the ship here and get it going again.

David - Angel did a good job here of activating the Angel Guild and got this open to a really nice number, but they’re still new to the sector and this probably could have been a considerable amount better for them. Christmas films have a specific window and that window opens in mid November, you need to be in the marketplace then. This should have opened against Running Man in mid November and if they had it would probably have been well past $100 million by now. Of course, the rationale was probably linked to avoiding Zootopia and Wicked, but as luck would have it, they still ended up with Zootopia to deal with and they ended up with Avatar and SpongeBob, so this could have been dated better. As these films do this time of year, it’s beginning to expire and looks down 45% for a weekend in the high single digits.

Anaconda - Sony did a really nice job of getting this open, and they ended up tapping into a nice hispanic skew and played a little later into the night than the rest of the Christmas slate. But even though the exit polls are good, it’s been falling a little faster than the other Christmas films. This could be another casualty of The Housemaid’s surge, but this looks down 50% for the weekend for a weekend in the high single digits.

Spongebob: The Search for Squarepants - Paramount did everything right here but just got unlucky, Zootopia really held this down (and to a certain extent David). And going back to the dating conversations you have on films, this film planted its pole in the sand on this date in October……2023, so who knew it would end up in a tough competitive landscape? What’s tough here is that this is a TV based Animation IP and for the most part, the animation doesn’t have the richness of visuals you see in the high end animation of Pixar, and if it’s going to soar it needs a clear marketplace. So the upside of this is you make a viable theatrical animated Family release at a price, but when there’s an outlier 9 figure budget animated film against it, it’s not going to be a fair fight. Up until October, when David dropped against it, and then December, when Zootopia started its outlier run, this all looked fine. But it is what it is and because it got made for a price, Paramount should be fine on it, but why it’s doing what it’s doing is just bad luck. However, it is hanging in there today and looks like it’s going to only drop 30% this weekend for a gross in the mid/high single digits.

Song Sung Blue - This has been a weird film to watch, it’s clearly aimed at older females and that has showed up in the grosses each day. It had a really good New Year’s Eve and an okay New Year’s Day (which aligns with the core demo), but it seems as if Focus has really chased this all week with a really substantial spend. That’s showing up today, and it’s not down much from last week. If this ever got a little younger it could leg out, and that might be what we’re seeing today, but this looks down 30% or maybe a little less for a weekend of about $5 million.

We Bury The Dead - Yep, there’s a new release today, Vertical released this on 1200 screens and it looks on the high end of what we normally see from Vertical. Figure a weekend of about $1.5 million.