Box Office: Jack Quaid’s ‘Novocaine’ Aims to Dethrone ‘Mickey 17’ With $10 Million Debut

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In the upcoming action comedy “Novocaine,” starring Jack Quaid, is set to challenge the current box office leader, “Mickey 17,” for the number one position this week.

According to predictions, the movie “Novocaine” is expected to generate earnings of around $10 million to $12 million during its debut weekend in North American theaters, with showings across approximately 3,300 screens. This film comes from Paramount Pictures and carries a production budget of $18 million. In this movie, Dennis Quaid portrays an ordinary individual who is unable to feel pain, a characteristic that proves beneficial when his beloved is kidnapped during a bank robbery.

The box office earnings from ticket sales are predicted to outperform “Mickey 17,” which is projected to drop by approximately 55% to 60% in its second week, earning around $8 million to $9 million. To date, the dystopian sci-fi comedy directed by Bong Joon Ho and starring Robert Pattinson has earned $20.5 million domestically and $54 million globally. Despite these figures, which are impressive for an original film in current theater settings, “Mickey 17” was made at a cost of $118 million, and it needs to gross around $275 million to $300 million globally just to break even in theaters, according to industry insiders familiar with similar productions.

This weekend, two new movies are hitting theaters – “Black Bag,” a stylish R-rated thriller directed by Steven Soderbergh, and “Opus,” a quirky surrealist satire starring Ayo Edebiri and John Malkovich. Neither film is predicted to make a significant impact at the box office, with opening weekends in the single digits. Specifically, “Black Bag” hopes to earn between $7 million and $8 million from 2,705 theaters, while “Opus” anticipates taking in $2 million to $4 million from 1,300 cinemas.

Currently, Disney’s Marvel film “Captain America: Brave New World” is estimated to generate approximately $5 million during its fifth week in theaters. Starring Anthony Mackie, this superhero adventure has amassed a total of $177 million in the U.S. and an additional $370.8 million globally. Despite being the highest-grossing Hollywood release of the year, these earnings are far from enough to compensate for its hefty production cost of $180 million.

If the current trend continues, “Captain America: Brave New World” may end up as one of the least profitable Marvel films ever made, outperforming the box office failures like “The Marvels” (2023) and “The Incredible Hulk” (2011), but still falling into the category of underperformers such as “Eternals” (2021) and “Ant Man and the Wasp: Quantumania” (2023). Marvel has two more films, “Thunderbolts” in May 2 and “The Fantastic Four: First Steps” in July, scheduled for release in 2025.

Unlike the other two new arrivals, the independent film “Opus” doesn’t enjoy the backing of positive critical reviews. On Rotten Tomatoes, it currently holds a 39% “rotten” rating. Despite this, its budget was under $10 million, which means it doesn’t need to make much money to turn a profit. In the film, Ayo Edebiri, known for her roles in “The Bear” and “Bottoms”, portrays a young writer who journeys to a secluded complex once inhabited by a legendary pop star (John Malkovich), who mysteriously vanished 30 years ago. EbMaster‘s Tomris Laffly was unimpressed, commenting that even the combined talents of Ayo Edebiri and John Malkovich couldn’t save A24’s overly silly horror spoof on fan culture.

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2025-03-12 16:48