‘Indiana Jones 5’ tops box office before July 4 underperforms

The final journey of Harrison Ford’s iconic hero, Indiana Jones, topped the box office again this weekend. However, despite opening at No. 1, “Indiana Jones and the Disc of Fate” failed to do enough business to become a profitable venture for Lucasfilm and Walt Disney Studios. Grayling Box Office Mojothe adventure film grossed $60.5 million in its opening weekend.

The film’s current worldwide total after its opening weekend is estimated at $130.5 million.

Indiana Jones and the Fates lead the box office with $60.5 million

The problem with a movie like “Song of Destiny” that opens with $60.5 million is an incredibly expensive hill to climb. The film received negative reviews after a lukewarm debut at the Cannes Film Festival and poor reviews. With more and more reviews coming in, critics have been more or less mildly positive towards the film, with a current critic rating of 69% Rotten tomatoes.

However, the main problem with “Song of Destiny” is the extremely large budget. Species reports that the film’s budget is $295 million, and that’s before prints and publicity, which can also be quite expensive for a film like this.

The last Indiana Jones movie, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, was released 15 years ago in 2008. The film opened much higher over Memorial Day Weekend in May 2008, earning $100 million over the three-day period. about $126 million for the four-day extended holiday weekend. Not only is “The Dial of Destiny” more expensive than “Crystal Skull’s” $185 million budget, but it also opened much lower.

“Crystal Skull” ended its theatrical run with $317 million domestically and $790 million. Unless “Song of Destiny” can somehow make an amazing comeback, it’s highly unlikely that the film will make much money for Lucasfilm’s parent company, Walt Disney Studios.

Elsewhere, Pixar’s “Elemental” took a major dip in its third weekend, returning to No. 2 with $12.1 million. This brings the film’s domestic total to around $89 million and $187 million worldwide. The film is another box office disappointment for Pixar and Disney, but at least it managed to do some decent business in the coming weeks. Unfortunately, “Elemental” also faces the problem that the competitive summer box office and high costs will make margins incredibly high with a $200 million budget.

Sony’s “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse” continues to be one of the biggest hits of the summer. The film brought in another $12 million in its fifth weekend, bringing its current domestic total to $340 million and $607 million worldwide. With a budget of around $100 million, far less than many other big tentpoles this summer, “Across the Spider-Verse” will likely be one of the more profitable big releases of 2023.

In fourth place, Jennifer Lawrence’s recently released R-rated comedy “No Hard Feelings” dropped about 47.7 percent in its second weekend with another $7.8 million and $29.6 million. The only other big release over the weekend was DreamWorks Animation’s “Ruby Gillman, Teenage Kraken,” which opened incredibly low at No. 6 to just $5.5 million. The budget of the film is about 70 million dollars.

“Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny” will have to contend this weekend with the next installment of the wildly popular “Insidious” horror film franchise, “Insidious: The Red Door,” set for release on Friday, July 7. The irreverent, R-rated Friday also opens with the comedy “Joy Ride.”