Jack Black & Cate Blanchett Lead 'House With A Clock' To Magical Debut At The Box Office

When we think of guaranteed box office hitmaking stars, the talk revolves around people like Robert Downey, Jr., Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, Chris Pratt, Tom Cruise, etc… However, while everyone has been looking the other way, Jack Black has turned into a bit of a box office goldmine. And with his latest, “The House with a Clock in its Walls,” the comedic actor has turned another film that critics and pundits were doubting and created a bit of a surprise hit.

Debuting with an impressive $26.85 million, ‘House’ scored a #1 debut for Black and actress Cate Blanchett. The family-friendly horror film, from torture-porn pioneer Eli Roth, was thought to have a decent opening, but considering the production budget was a modest $42 million, the debut is a surprisingly strong start. And in the last three years, that’s exactly what Black has been consistently doing.

Last year, he starred opposite The Rock in “Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle,” and we know what happened there. Before that, it was “Kung Fu Panda 3,” which debuted at $41 million and grossed $520 million worldwide. However, back in 2015, Black starred in “Goosebumps,” which was another family-friendly horror film, which debuted at $23.6 million and went on to score $80 million domestic ($150 worldwide), with a budget of $58 million. If ‘House’ replicates that success, one would imagine that Universal would be very pleased.

The other new releases this weekend had pretty mixed results, to be generous. Michael Moore’s “Fahrenheit 11/9” debuted at #8 with an estimated total of $3.1 million. This isn’t a bad opening for a documentary, but compared to “Fahrenheit 9/11,” it does fall short. Granted, the previous doc had a ton of buzz and was coming off a Palme d’Or win during Cannes. While there was a decent amount of hype, ‘11/9’ just doesn’t have the same buzz.

But that’s the end of the good news for the big debuts. Falling outside of the top 10 were “Life Itself” (which found itself as part of an interesting controversy about criticism) and “Assassination Nation.” “Life Itself” debuted at #11 with an estimated $2.1 million. When final numbers come out tomorrow, there is a slight chance it could overtake “Searching” for #10. But either way, with a per-theater-average of $807, this can’t be viewed as anything other than disappointing. I’m sure filmmaker Dan Fogelman, of “This is Us” fame, is going to have some thoughts.

However, worse than “Life Itself” is “Assassination Nation,” which debuted at #15 with only $1 million and a dismal per-theater-average of $733. Not good, at all. ‘Nation’ does have the excuse of a cast of unknowns and a young filmmaker. That being said, a per-theater-average under $1,000 is never good.

Also under the “Not Good” banner is “The Predator.” After a soft opening last weekend, despite its #1, the second weekend saw a massive drop, as expected. Falling to #4, the action film sequel dropped 65% to earn $8.7 million. Sorry, ‘Predator’ fans, but it looks like any sequels are going to be off the board now.

As for the holdovers that are doing remarkably well, we have “A Simple Favor,” which experienced an incredibly strong drop of only 35%, finishing at #2 with $10.4 million. The Blake Lively/Anna Kendrick film, directed by Paul Feig, continues to overperform and earn a pretty penny. “The Nun” crossed a milestone in its third weekend of release, earning $10.25 million, with a domestic total of $101 million.

There were a couple of per-theater-average winners this weekend, with indie films “Colette” and “The Sisters Brothers” earning $39,197 and $30,507, respectively. Both are strong openings in only 4 theaters. Perhaps they can surprise as they open wider in the coming weeks.

Next weekend sees the release of horror film “Hell Fest,” family animated film “Smallfoot,” and Kevin Hart comedy “Night School.” Horror films will be coming weekly at this point, but it’s been a bit since we’ve had a strong comedy, so Hart could reign supreme. As always, it’ll be interesting to see what happens.

Here’s the entire top 10 for September 21 to 23:

1. The House With A Clock In Its Walls — $26.85M (Debut)
2. A Simple Favor — $10.4M ($32.6M Overall)
3. The Nun — $10.25M ($101M)
4. The Predator — $8.7M ($40.4M)
5. Crazy Rich Asians — $6.5M ($159M)
6. White Boy Rick — $5M ($17.4M)
7. Peppermint — $3.7M ($30.3M)
8. Fahrenheit 11/9 — $3.1 (Debut)
9. The Meg — $2.35M ($140.5M)
10. Searching — $2.175M ($23M)