Weekend projections: Bullet Train stays on course for $30-million debut

August 7, 2022

Bullet Train

Bullet Train will fall fractionally below our Friday-morning prediction, but is still on course for a $30-million opening weekend, according to Sony’s Sunday-morning projection. The result is notably higher than our model’s core prediction of $21.7 million, driven perhaps by the star power of Brad Pitt and director David Leitch, but maybe also because it falls more into the raw action category than the tentpole movies that have been inhabiting theaters over the past few months.

Here’s how the domestic numbers look as of Sunday morning (click on the image for the full chart of films reporting so far)…



Bullet Train will bag about $32.4 million internationally this weekend, making it the top-grossing film worldwide. Sony are claiming (and I don’t disagree) that it’s the biggest opening for a “non-IP” studio film since Tenet. Overall, the studio can chalk it up as a success, and it looks to have benefited from a good release date, with competition from the Summer blockbusters dying down.

Easter Sunday’s $5.25-million projected opening is a little more disappointing, although as I noted on Friday it was a hard film to predict, given that really nothing like it has been released in the post-pandemic era. Topping $5 million is a decent result, and Universal once again deserves some praise for backing a film that expands the theatrical envelope. The studio (including its Focus Features subsidiary) has seven films in the top thirteen this weekend and Universal currently sits as the top-grossing distributor of 2022. The studio last topped the distributors race in 2015 (incidentally, largely thanks to great performances from Jurassic World and Minions), and my money is on it doing so again this year.

One final note-worthy release this weekend is Bodies Bodies Bodies, which will post a projected $226,526 from 6 theaters, per A24. The distributor usually has a small engagement on opening weekend for its films, and this one falls somewhere between Marcel the Shell with Shoes On ($159,403 from 6 locations) and Everything Everywhere All At Once ($501,305 from 10). Marcel has earned $4.9 million so far, while Everything Everywhere now stands at $69.5 million, so the debut number for Bodies Bodies Bodies isn’t especially predictive, but it’ll be one to watch in the coming weeks.

- Studio weekend projections
- All-time biggest weekends - All-time top-grossing movies in North America
- All-time top-grossing movies worldwide

Bruce Nash,

Filed under: Brad Pitt, David Leitch