‘Red One’ With Dwayne Johnson & Chris Evans Eyes $30M-$33M Debut

FRIDAY MIDDAY: It will come down to Saturday to put the Dwayne Johnson–Chris Evans Amazon MGM Studios Christmas action movie Red One north of $30 million. Estimates we hear today put this family feature at close to $12M today and $30M-$33M over three days.

That three-day today would be above such Christmas movies as 2004’s The Polar Express ($23.3M opening, $170M production cost, final domestic $189.5M), in the league of the Will Ferrell comedy Elf ($32.1M opening, $33M production cost, $178M domestic box office) and well above 2007’s Fred Claus ($18.5M opening, $100M production cost, $72M domestic) and the 1996 Arnold Schwarzenegger actioner Jingle All the Way ($12.1M opening, $75 production cost, $60.5M domestic), the latter of which was deemed a seismic bomb back in its day. All are unadjusted for inflation.

According to social media analytics corp RelishMix, Red One‘s online marketing push is being fueled by Johnson’s Instagram videos, with 227.7M views off his 557.7M fans. Other social media stars include Chris Evan at 17.9M, Kiernan Shipka with 7.1M, Lucy Liu at 6.3 and Kristofer Hivju at 3.2M.

However, the social media reach sans cast is only 258.2M, which is ahead of Paramount’s IF (193.9M followers) but around the same as The Fall Guy. That original action movie with Ryan Gosling and Emily Blunt posted a $10.4M opening day and $27.7M three-day total in March.

Among the positive word of mouth, per RelishMix: “Some viewers and fans who have attended advance screenings sharing their enthusiasm for the movie. The focus on holiday mythology and creatures is exciting many, with comments like, ‘I’m happy for a Christmas Movie that builds on mythology!’ and, ‘To be honest this looks quite fun to watch. The giant snow man fights is what brought me here.’ The breezy tone and fun atmosphere is also drawing in viewers, with comments including, ‘I see this as a fun watch for the holidays! something to laugh & relax with,’ and, ‘Saw this tonight. Loved it from beginning to end. It was just all kinds of fun.’

Among the negative chatter, the complaint is over the VFX: “This movie make no sense … so many fakes in cgi,” and “CGI mess with no heart or magic.”

FRIDAY AM: The very expensive but typically priced $200 million-plus Christmas package Red One starring Dwayne Johnson began its box office journey last night with previews totaling $3.7 million. Note that the figure also includes monies from a Sunday special screening. The movie has been sitting still on tracking for quite some time with a $30M-$35M projection for its opening frame.

At that level, it would be the biggest opening ever posted for a feature production from a streamer, besting Apple Original Films’ Killers of the Flower Moon ($23.2M) and not counting Amazon’s release of then-newly acquired MGM’s Creed III ($58.3M). Red One originally was conceived as a straight-to-service Prime Video release before Amazon MGM pivoted to theatrical following solid test scores.

In regards to preview comps, Red One is above Elemental ($2.4M previews, $29.6M opening), IF ($1.75M previews, 3-day $33.7M) and The Wild Robot ($1.95M, 3-day $35.7M). Note, when it comes to non-IP movies opening between $30M-$40M, there have only been four post-Covid: Bullet Train ($30M), M3GAN ($30.4M), The Lost City ($30.4M) and IF ($33.7M). In regards to non-IP movies debuting to $40M-$50M post-Covid, there is just Jordan Peele’s Nope ($44.3M).

There’s a lot to unpack here this weekend as Red One, which was greenlighted by Amazon MGM head Jennifer Salke and shepherded by Film Production and Development head Julie Rapaport, is only expected to post $35M in its opening stateside, give or take. Hopefully, the movie can overperform given there hasn’t been a big production in the marketplace since October 25, when Venom: The Last Dance opened to $51M.

For a traditional major motion picture studio, Red One would be a black eye with its expected domestic opening; look at what Warner Bros Discovery (market cap: $22.8 billion) had to endure with a $100M loss on the near-$200M-priced + PA Joker: Folie à Deux, which fell on its face with $206.3M worldwide. But for Amazon (market cap: $2.1 trillion), the cost of Red One is a rounding error.

Amazon MGM defends that monetization on Red One will be fully realized down the road in how it triggers other parts of the shopping conglom’s business and the Prime Video service as well. That’s a hard pill for traditional motion picture studios, even those with streaming services, to swallow. But alas, all those box office blunders from Apple, with its $200M productions, has that tech company rethinking its movie strategy. More on everything later.

The hope for Amazon on this Christmas movie is that it will last for generations to come on the service as it continues to build its library. Last year’s Candy Cane Lane already was watchable for Prime, and these titles, a la Netflix’s Christmas Chronicles, pop back up in menus each holiday season.

Reviews are awful at 34% Rotten on the Seven Bucks Production movie about the kidnapping of Santa Claus (J.K. Simmons) and his rescue by his head of security (Johnson), who gets help from an underground dark web hacker (Evans). Shipka and Lucy Liu also co-star in this reteam between Johnson and Jumanji director Jake Kasdan. Bad reviews are par for the course on a Johnson movie, which historically look to please masses over critics, e.g. recent RT scores on such Johnson fare as Rampage (51%), San Andreas (48%) and Black Adam (39%). Johnson has proved stronger in his CinemaScores; San Andreas and Rampage both received an A-, for example, and Black Adam got a B+.

Red One, of course, has the full command of all Imax and PLF screens.

Already, Red One, via Amazon MGM Studios’ international output deal with Warner Bros, has made $36M to date in 75 offshore territories. That’s not amazing. But keep in mind, Christmas isn’t celebrated everywhere in the world.

The rest of the week: