J.J. Abrams’ Star Wars: The Force Awakens topped the weekend box office for the fourth time in a row with $41.6 million, bringing its all-time record (not adjusted for inflation) domestic total to $812 million, but the more surprising bit of news was the powerful debut of Alexander Inarritu’s The Revenant, which opened much stronger than expected, earning an estimated $38 million, and helping push the box office to a 22.8% gain over the same weekend last year when Taken 3 debuted with $39 million.

The Force Awakens set an opening weekend (Saturday-Sunday) in China, earning $53 million in just two days, and driving the film’s worldwide total to $1.669 billion, good enough for third place all time (not adjusted for inflation).  Domestically with $812 million The Force Awakens has set the new record (not adjusted for inflation), and, even when accounting for inflation, the latest Star Wars film is now 15th on the all-time domestic list having passed The Phantom Menace ($771 million in inflation-adjusted dollars), Jurassic Park ($791 million), and Return of the Jedi ($809 million).  The Force Awakens will definitely pass Avatar ($837 million adjusted), Ben Hur ($843 million), and The Empire Strikes Back ($845 million), though the original Star Wars film (retitled “A New Hope”) remains unassailable with an adjusted domestic total of $1.2 billion.

Next weekend The Force Awakens will face strong competition from the comedy Ride Along 2, and the Benghazi-themed 13 Hours, so its reign at the top of the weekend charts may be over.  While $900 million domestic appears assured at this point, reaching a billion dollars domestically could be tough unless there are some Oscar nods, though Disney will probably try to keep the movie in theaters as long as possible.  Overseas, the key is the Chinese market.  Chinese audiences are largely unfamiliar with the Star Wars saga, so it should be interesting to see to what extent they embrace it.

The weekend’s other big box office news stems from the strong debut of Alexander Inarritu’s The Revenant, an “R” rated revenge saga set in the brutal cold of the American West in the 1820s.  The Revenant, which cost $135 million, is one expensive art film, so it is good news for the folks at New Regency and Fox that the film posted Leonardo DiCaprio’s fourth best opening ever.  In just a few days The Revenant will surpass Inarritu’s Birdman ($42 million) to become the director’s highest-grossing film in the American market.  Given The Revenant’s length, dark tone, violence and grueling struggles for survival, the strong opening demonstrates that there is still such a thing as “star power” in a 21st Century Hollywood where “franchise power” has often replaced “star power” as the key factor in the studios’ planning.   The question is will there be a wide audience for The Revenant?  The answer may lie in the number of Oscar nominations that the film garners.  DiCaprio has been overlooked in past Oscar contests, but this appears to be his year, especially since Oscar voters generally respond positively to actors who suffer for their art, and there is no doubt that what is seen on screen in The Revenant could not have been accomplished without a huge amount of discomfort to its star and the rest of the cast and crew.

Weekend Box Office (Studio Estimates): January 8-10, 2016

Film

Weekend Gross

Screens

Avg./Screen

Total Gross

Wk#

1

Star Wars: The Force Awakens

$41,630,000

4,134

$10,070

$812,011,043

4

2

The Revenant

$38,000,000

3,375

$11,259

$39,556,901

3

3

Daddy's Home

$15,000,000

3,483

$4,307

$116,313,576

3

4

The Forest

$13,088,000

2,451

$5,340

$13,088,000

1

5

Sisters

$7,170,000

2,864

$2,503

$74,879,945

4

6

The Hateful Eight

$6,351,000

2,938

$2,162

$41,473,820

3

7

The Big Short

$6,300,000

2,529

$2,491

$42,849,837

5

8

Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Road Chip

$5,500,000

2,972

$1,851

$75,608,339

4

9

Joy

$4,500,000

2,513

$1,791

$46,555,608

3

10

Concussion

$3,050,000

2,056

$1,483

$30,968,278

3




Meanwhile Will Ferrell’s poorly reviewed comedy Daddy’s Home continues to be this season’s “under the radar hit” as it earned an estimated $15 million, good enough for third place.  Having earned $116.3 million in just 17 days, Daddy’s Home should end up well north of $150 million in the domestic market.

Another January tradition involves the debut of horror film, since typically it’s been several months since the release of a cluster of horror films in October.  The first horror film release of 2016 is The Forest, a poorly-reviewed (just 12% positive on Rotten Tomatoes) cinematic riff on Japan’s “suicide forest,” that actually got off to a strong start with a $13 million bow.  Produced for just $10 million, The Forest will likely fade quickly, but not before it ends up with a small profit for Gramercy Pictures.

The Tina Fey/Amy Poehler comedy Sisters also continues to chug along, dropping 43% and earning $7.2 million in its fourth weekend and driving its domestic total to $75 million.  The only other film to avoid a greater than 50% drop this weekend was Adam McKay’s excellent The Big Short, another movie that could benefit from potential Oscar nods.

The film that took the brunt of The Revenant’s potent debut was Quentin Tarantino’s cold weather western The Hateful Eight, which dropped 60% in spite of adding 464 theaters to bring its total to nearly 3000.  The Hateful Eight earned just $6.35 million, bringing its total to $41.5 million.  Since The Hateful Eight cost just $44 million to produce, it should end up making money, espcially since Tarantino’s films have done very well overseas in the past.

Say good-bye to Point Break, Warner Bros. expensive ($105 million) remake, which landed at #11 in its third weekend, and has earned just $26.7 million to date.  Let’s hope 2016 will be a better year for Warner Bros., which definitely took it on the chin this year with attempts to create new franchises like The Man From U.N.C.L.E. and Pan that were just flat out failures, and no superhero smash to make up for the studio’s many misfires.

Be sure to check back here next weekend to see if Ride Along 2 with Kevin Hart, or Michael Bay’s “serious” look at the Benghazi attack, 13 Hours can unseat The Force Awakens.