'Bullet Train' tops box office 2nd week in a row
Brad Pitt and Sandra Bullock star in "Bullet Train." Credit: Sony Pictures via AP / Scott Garfield
The Brad Pitt action film "Bullet Train" led all movies in ticket sales for a second straight weekend, according to studio estimates Sunday, while a quiet spell in theaters and incredible staying power allowed "Top Gun: Maverick" to rocket back into third place in its 12th week of release.
After launching the previous weekend with about $30 million at the box office, "Bullet Train" pulled in $13.4 million in its second go-round. David Leitch's assassin-crowded film, made for $90 million, has grossed $54.4 million in two weeks for Sony Pictures. Globally, "Bullet Train" has grossed $114.5 million.
Three new films went into wide release but none cracked the top five films. The slowdown — an expected but still acute late-summer downturn in big releases — gave plenty of airspace for the year's biggest movie, "Maverick," to make another flyby in theaters.
Nearly three months after opening in May, Paramount Pictures put the "Top Gun" sequel back on a number of large-format screens and increased its theater count from 2,760 to 3,181. It came away with $7.2 million, bringing its cumulative total to $673.8 million. Paramount's biggest smash ever, "Maverick" sits at seventh all-time in domestic box office, not accounting for inflation, right above "Titanic" and just below "Avengers: Infinity War."
"Top Gun: Maverick" was very narrowly edged for second place by Warner Bros.' "DC League of Super-Pets." Warner Bros. estimated Sunday that its animated movie took in $7.17 million in its third week of release, just a nose above the $7.15 million for "Maverick." Final figures Monday should break the near-tie.
The biggest new film in nationwide theaters was A24's "Bodies Bodies Bodies," a Gen Z horror comedy that expanded to 1,269 locations after last week's opening in limited release. It came in eighth with $3.3 million.
Lionsgate's "The Fall," about two friends stranded atop a 2,000-foot radio tower, debuted with $2.5 million. Diane Keaton's body-swap comedy "Mack & Rita" opened with just $1 million in ticket sales for Gravitas Ventures.
