Street Fighter dominates the US box office, but Nathan Fielder springs a surprise

The film inspired by Capcom’s video game had the best start of the weekend with $31 million. But the event mainly comes from You Can See Everything, the documentary dedicated to Elizabeth Holmes…

The fight was won in advance.

Street Fighterproduced by Paramount, Legendary and Capcom, takes the lead at the North American box office with an estimated start of $31 million on more than 3,500 screens. An honorable result, even if Paramount obviously hoped for a little better. The film is notably 19% less than Mortal Kombat 2, which opened to $38.5 million a few months ago.

The audience is also quite clearly identified: men over 35 represent 45% of spectators.

To measure the progress made by the franchise streetfighter, we have to go back to 1994. At the time, the adaptation by Jean-Claude Van Damme had only collected 7 to 8 million dollars during its first weekend, in 1,671 North American theaters. She nevertheless ended her career with $99.4 million in worldwide revenue, including $33.4 million in the United States, for a production budget of $35 million. The new film therefore does much better at the start.

But the real attraction of the weekend is, You Can See Everythingthe three-hour documentary dedicated to Elizabeth Holmes. Distributed by A24, the film by Nathan Fielder, the creator of The Curse, is expected to gross nearly $15 million in just 855 theaters. This is the second best start in history for a documentary, behind Fahrenheit 9/11 by Michael Moore, which opened to $23.9 million in 2004.

The attendance figures demonstrate unusual enthusiasm: more than 2,000 screenings were sold out, while queues formed in front of certain venues, notably at the Village East in New York. The audience is also much younger than that of Street Fighter : 18-34 year olds represent 62% of spectators.

Eight years after the collapse of Theranos, the blood testing company founded by Holmes, and four years after the miniseries The Dropoutworn by Amanda Seyfried and awarded the Emmy Awards, interest in this affair therefore remains intact. A24 notably created the event by presenting the film in secret at the Telluride festival. A strategy that seems to have borne fruit.

Not everyone has the same luck. At 20th Century Studios, Engulfedwhich has a production budget of $60 million, is expected to gross just $7.5 million in its opening weekend. A particularly difficult start for this production which will have to rely on the continuation of its operation to limit the damage.

Another novelty, Reason and Feelingsa new adaptation of Jane Austen’s novel with Daisy Edgar-Jones, settles for fifth place and an estimated start of $7 million.

A modest result compared to the course of the 1995 version directed by Ang Lee, written by Emma Thompson, also starring alongside Kate Winslet. Buoyed by its seven Oscar nominations and solid word of mouth, the film enjoyed a long run in theaters, reaching $135 million in worldwide revenue for a budget of $16.5 million.

Finally, Evil (Other Mommy), the horror film starring Jessica Chastain, experienced a second week in sharp decline. It earned almost $8 million over the weekend, a drop of 72%. Its North American total has now reached $45 million.