Weekend predictions: Scream could make second $50-million start in two weeks

March 10, 2023

Scream VI

Scream VI is looking like a surefire winner at the box office this weekend after growing buzz over the past few weeks and strong reviews (for a horror film) built up to $5.7 million in previews on Thursday, considerably more than the $3.5 million earned by Scream (V) last year. Its predecessor earned $30 million on opening weekend, and $50 million looks within reach for Scream VI this weekend.

Here’s what our model thought of Scream VI going into the weekend:

As I mentioned last week when I looked at Creed III, the most accurate way to predict how much a new release in franchise will earn on opening weekend is to look at the previous film. In this case, Scream opened with $30 million in January last year, at a time when our model estimated the market was at exactly half its pre-pandemic strength. That translates into about $50 million given the current market and the fact that the new film is playing in a few more theaters. Our pre-weekend audience tracking pulled the prediction down by 10%.

Then the preview numbers pop things right back up again.

It’s worth noting that Scream had a previews-to-weekend multiplier of 8.58, which would translate into a final weekend total of $48.9 million for Scream VI. So it wouldn’t be surprising if Scream VI comes in just under $50 million this weekend. In fact, I’d put its chances of topping $50 million at around 50–50. That’s still an excellent number for the franchise, and the newcomer will beat Scream 3’s unadjusted $34.7 million to earn the best opening weekend for the Scream franchise.

65 won’t come close to Scream, but it’s looking like it’ll do healthy business. Here’s what the model thought coming into the weekend…

Non-franchise, PG-13 sci-fi movies generally open somewhere around $10 million, and the model thought 65 would be no exception. The preview numbers bolster expectations a bit though…

65 is a little hard to compare to other sci-fi films, but earning 12 times its preview figure is a good benchmark, and that puts something in the low teens in its sights.

The final wide release of the weekend is Champions…

The Bobby Farrelly-directed sports comedy didn’t report previews last night, so we only have the model’s pre-weekend prediction to go on. That actually looks pretty respectable to me, and realistically topping $5 million would be a win for this movie.

80 for Brady, which is the most obvious recent comparable film, opened with $12.7 million last month, so there is some upside potential for Champions. If it was doing that kind of business, I think we’d have seen a report on its preview numbers by now though.

Here’s what that model thinks the top 10 will look like.

It’s going to be Scream all the way this weekend, but the second weekend of Creed III will be interesting too. The model thinks it’ll fall by close to 60%, but some good word of mouth may save it. In any case, it looks as though an “up” weekend at the box office is on the cards.

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Filed under: Weekend Preview, Creed III, 65, Scream VI, Champions, 80 for Brady, Scream, Bobby Farrelly