Weekend Box Office: WEAPONS Re-Takes First Place as Summer Concludes

Key Takeaways

Total 3-Day Weekend Gross:
$63,645,404 | -17.4% Last Week / -22.7% Weekend 35, 2024

Labor Day Weekend brings summer ’25 to a close with Weapons once again on top with $10.2M for the 3-Day, plus Universal’s Jaws re-release gobbling up ticket sales at #2 with $8.1M. Newcomers Caught Stealing and The Roses were not able to get a word in edgewise, being far more suited for Q3.

• Top Title: Weapons (Warner Bros.) | $10.2M / 3416 Screens / $2,989 PSA | Week 4
• Top Opener: Caught Stealing (Sony) | $7.8M / 3,578 Screens / $2,187 PSA | Week 1
• Best PSA: Love, Brooklyn (Greenwich) | $49K / 1 Screen / $49,000 PSA | Week 1

Highlights From the Weekend

1. Weapons
Warner Bros. | Week 4
$10.2M 3-Day Weekend | $132.39M Domestic Total
$234.6M Global Total

After losing its one-weekend battle with KPop Demon Hunters, WB’s horror hit Weapons is back on top, ending the summer with a $10.2M take from 3,416 screens with a -34% drop and $2,989 Per Screen Average. Adding in a projected $12.4M for the four-day Labor Day weekend, the Zach Cregger film is looking at $134.6M domestic and $234.6M globally. Surprisingly, Weapons has carried the entire month of August as opposed to Disney tentpoles like Fantastic Four or Freakier Friday… another notch in the win column for originals this year.

Here’s how the 3-Day looked…

• Friday – $2.7M
• Saturday – $3.85M
• Sunday – $3.66M

With The Conjuring: Last Rites possessing the box office next frame, this will likely be Weapons‘ last hurrah at the top but it has shown enough legs that it should be around for at least another month. WB/New Line would be smart to package both Conjuring and Weapons as a spooky double feature later in their runs as we get into Halloween season.

Overseas the International total on Weapons ran to $100M, with the global total at $234.6M. That’s better than Sinners‘ international take of $87.1M. Current Top 3 markets are the UK ($13.9M), Mexico ($8.6M), and France ($7.6M).

3. Caught Stealing
Sony | NEW
$7.8M 3-Day Opening Weekend | $13.2M Global Total

Sony’s release of director Darren Aronofsky’s wild crime flick Caught Stealing disappointed with $7.8M on 3,578 screens for a $2,187 PSA. That’s even a little below our panel’s lowest-end prediction for where it would land, and to add insult to injury it debuted beneath the re-release of 50-year-old Jaws. The studio is projecting a $9.5M take for the 4-Day holiday weekend. This is another underperformer for fledgling star Austin Butler after The Bikeriders and Eddington, although no one would fault him for wanting to work with an ace auteur like Aronofsky.

Here’s how the 3-Day looked, including $1.2M from Thursday previews…

• Friday – $3.3M
• Saturday – $2.35M
• Sunday – $2.17M

Rotten Tomatoes critical was 84% and audience score was a similar 86%, while CinemaScore audiences gave it a “B.” None of this is bad, but for an original movie with this niche of appeal (late 90’s, punk rock, etc) to open big in an end-of-summer slot would require across-the-board raves. Aronofsky’s films like Black Swan or The Whale are often platformed during awards season before going wider.

The Caught Stealing opening is not his lowest wide release performer (that would be the $3.7M debut for The Fountain in 2006), but it’s on par with the $7.5M bow for mother! in 2017. This was a film that perhaps needed a better release date and appeal beyond Film Twitter and Letterboxd crowds.

Overseas the movie brought in $5.4 million from 5,950+ screens in 48 markets. That brings the global total to $13.2M.

Other Notable Performances

Universal’s 50th anniversary re-release of Steven Spielberg’s Jaws brought in an estimated $8.1M from 3,200 North American theaters, and a projected $9.8M for the 4-Day. That 2nd place finish includes $2.2M from 400 IMAX locations, representing 21% of the domestic take. That brings the domestic lifetime total of the 1975 classic to $280.35M and $491M globally.

Searchlight’s The Roses starring Benedict Cumberbatch and Olivia Colman opened to $6.35M in 5th place, and a projected $8M for the 4-Day. It joins this year’s The Naked Gun and I Know What You Did Last Summer by opening below a previous decades-old iteration, aka 1989’s The War of the Roses which bowed to $9.68M. Reviews were “meh” at 65% on RT alongside a “B+” CinemaScore.

After Legendary spent a long while trying to find a distributor, the modern day redo of Troma’s cult classic The Toxic Avenger starring Peter Dinklage got a $1.75M launch from Cineverse (the folks behind Terrifier 3) outside of the Top 10. Projected 4-Day gross is $2.2M. Rotten Tomatoes critical was largely positive at 83%, as was audience score with 86%.

Next Weekend

The fall season kicks off with a bang next frame as WB’s The Conjuring: Last Rites arrives like an apparition of money into theaters. The previous eight films in the decade+ old series have brought in $824.47M domestically and over $2.3B WW. The fact that this is being billed as the “final” chapter in the saga of paranormal investigators The Warrens (played by Vera Farmiga and Patrick Wilson) should build anticipation levels enough to make this the studio’s fourth big horror hit this year after Sinners, Final Destination, and Weapons.

Sunday Studio Estimates | Weekend 35 – 2025
Total 3-Day Domestic Gross: $63,645,404 | (-22.7% vs 2024)