The two big Thanksgiving titles, Walt Disney Animation’s original Hexed and Universal/Paramount’s comedy Focker-in-Law starring Ariana Grande, Robert De Niro and Ben Stiller, hit tracking with a forecast of $40 million-$50 million apiece over five days.
Remember, there’s the second weekend of Lionsgate’s The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping in the mix and has the potential to beat both openers over the Wednesday-Sunday holiday stretch; presales for that Francis Lawrence-directed prequel are just volcanic hot.
No, it won’t be a Thanksgiving like the last two years, which had a big Wicked movie as well as huge Disney animation titles — Moana 2 in 2024 and Zootopia 2 last year — but moviegoing will be in session as we barrel toward a hopeful $10 billion domestic year. Again, it’s always about the product, and we have a movie starring Wicked Oscar nominee Grande, hello.
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Universal has been high on Focker-in-Law having screened the John Hamburg-directed comedy early to the press since October. Paramount has the pic overseas (the franchise was originally a DreamWorks live-action feature production).
Hexed isn’t a musical, rather a narrative movie with needle-drop songs: read lead voice-over star Hailee Steinfeld just released the remix single of the Cars’ “Magic.”
Hexed follows an awkward teen named Billie (Steinfeld) and her Type-A mother (Rashida Jones) who learn Billie’s peculiarities might be magical powers, transforming their lives and revealing a hidden magical realm. Jodie Foster plays baddie Queen Celeste in her first Disney animated pic, returning the Candleshoe and Freaky Friday actress to the Mouse House.
Women are best on tracking in first choice for Hexed, higher than Wild Robot ($35.8M 3-day opening), Elemental ($29.6M 3-day) and Elio ($20.8M 3-day). The pic we hear is also pacing ahead of the five-day total of Encanto ($40.5M 5-day Thanksgiving), which hit screens as everyone was figuring out to return to theaters post-Covid. Tickets have been on sale for Hexed for the past two weeks.
When it comes to the top 10 openings at the five-day Thanksgiving box office, nine of the 10 slots are Disney movies, led by Moana 2 with $225.4M and Good Dinosaur at No. 10 with $55.4M.
Focker-in-Law is great in first choice with women over 25, women under 25 and men over 25. Overall first choice is ahead of Practical Magic 2 ($30M 3-day) and Freakier Friday ($28.5M). Tickets recently went on sale, so it’s still early in the pic’s campaign.
Blurb for Focker-in-Law, the fourth movie in the Meet the Parents franchise: A young man named Henry, son of Greg and Pam Focker, faces family chaos when he decides to marry a strong-willed woman who appears to be his complete mismatch.
Through three movies, the Meet the Parents series has amassed $1.16 billion at the global box office.
The biggest Thanksgiving ever at the box office was 2024. with all titles grossing $424.9M over Wednesday-Sunday. Last year was the fifth highest at $290.3M, per Rentrak.
