Weekend predictions: Indiana Jones shooting for $70 million this weekend

June 30, 2023

Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny may break an unusual record this weekend by opening with fewer millions of dollars than the age of its leading star. The fifth movie in the franchise would need to top $80 million to outscore the age of its octogenarian lead, Harrison Ford, and it looks likely to come up short. The last tentpole adventure film to do that was probably 2017’s The Mummy, which stumbled out the gate with $31.6 million, in spite of having to cross a lower bar: Tom Cruise was “just” 54 when that film debuted. Indy will most likely come in somewhere around $70 million.

Here’s how our model looked at Dial of Destiny coming into the weekend:

A comparison with a film that opened 15 years ago is hardly ideal, but franchises tend to be their own thing, and my best efforts haven’t found a better way of predicting how a new film will perform than comparing it with previous outings in the franchise, at least back to around 2000 when the “modern” era of blockbuster opening weekends began. The relative strength of the theatrical market pulls the prediction down to about $85 million, which is in line with our audience tracking.

The preview number points towards $80 million being a big stretch over its first three days in release though:

Our preview adjustments have trended a little on the high side in the past few months, so the prediction from the previews at $69.9 million suggests even a $70-million opening might be out of reach. The historical strength of the franchise pushes the prediction just over that level.

Ruby Gillman, Teenage Kraken had more modest ambitions going into this weekend.

Animated movies without strong associated brands tend to come with around $10 million to $20 million under normal conditions, and the model thinks $14 million or so would be par for this one.

Its preview numbers point to something around the same amount:

The broader industry consensus is that Ruby Gillman will fail to hit $10 million this weekend, which raises the question whether the model is seeing something that everyone else is missing. I think the point of comparison here is Paws of Fury: The Legend of Hank, which earned 12.52 times its Thursday previews on opening weekend. If Ruby Gillman does that, it’ll come in with $9.1 million.

What the chart above tells us is that previews for animated films aren’t great predictors of opening weekend though, with multipliers anywhere between 10.41 and 35.23. I wouldn’t bet on Ruby hitting $15 million this weekend, but I think topping $10 million isn’t out of the question yet. Its biggest challenge will be luring families away from Elemental, which is getting good word of mouth, and frankly hasn’t been seen by many people yet.

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

My bet is that Ruby Gillman and Elemental will trade places when the final numbers are in, with Elemental in second with closer to $15 million and Ruby Gillman in fourth with something around $10 million.

Dial of Destiny will run away with the treasure this weekend, and will have a good run through July 4. Its audience will probably skew a little older than typical for an adventure movie, thanks to Harrison Ford’s longstanding fan base, which could help its legs. But even if it tops our $73.8-million prediction, it will almost certainly have a slightly disappointing start for Disney.

That seems to be the story for the month of June, which is probably more due to competition between a lot of films, none of which has reached must-see status, than inherent weakness in the market. Once all the numbers are in, we should see around $150 million spent at the box office this weekend, a level that the market has reached for four out of the last five weekends. Notably, we’ll have the number one movie earning more than $50 million for the tenth time in the last twelve weekends. The last time that happened was the Summer of 2017.

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Bruce Nash

Filed under: Weekend Preview, Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, Ruby Gillman, Teenage Kraken, Elemental, Tom Cruise, Harrison Ford