It was another disappointingly quiet weekend at the box office. Mel Gibson’s new thriller Flight Risk took the top spot on the charts with a measly $12 million. That’s not much for theater owners to celebrate as this is slow even by January standards. But horror fans had a little something to cheer about as director Steven Soderbergh’s acclaimed POV supernatural horror flick Presence finally hit theaters following its festival run last year. While it didn’t light up the charts, it did well enough for a low-budget affair.
See also: Steven Soderbergh’s First Person PRESENCE Is Haunting
The film, which was written by Jurassic Park scribe David Koepp, landed at number six on the charts with $3.415 million (that .415 will become important in a moment). Again, not exactly a monster sum, but that was enough to give it the edge over Blumhouse’s Wolf Man, which made just $3.4 million in its second weekend. That represents a huge 69% drop compared to last weekend when director Leigh Whannell’s reinvention of the werewolf mythos opened to less than $11 million.
Wolf Man carries a $25 million budget, hails from a major distributor in Universal Pictures and was playing on more than 3,300 screens over the weekend. Presence, meanwhile, hails from NEON and was playing on just 1,750 screens, so its pre-screen average was far better. When all’s said and done, these movies virtually tied this weekend, but Presence had the bigger, shall we say, presence at the theaters it was playing it.
I have seen chatter trying to frame this opening as a disappointment. Is it going to be a monster hit like Longlegs? By no means. But let’s try and add some perspective here. The film coss less than $2 million to make, with Soderbergh shooting it in just 11 days. NEON then acquired the film and, though the price they paid wasn’t revealed, it’s believed to be in the $10 million range. So long as the film doesn’t utterly collapse next weekend and so long as it does some business overseas, it will be just fine. It will make its money on VOD and, in a case like this, that’s a win.
The inventive film is shot entirely in POV and centers on a family who moves into a suburban house and becomes convinced they’re not alone. It stars Lucy Liu, Chris Sullivan, Callina Liang, Eddy Maday, West Mulholland and Julia Fox. The only thing that might hurt it in the coming weeks is audience reception. Critics generally loved it but audiences? More mixed. It carries a C+ CinemaScore, which is pretty bad for a horror film. Again, with a low budget and minimal marketing spend, everyone should come out on the other side fine here.
Elsewhere, Nosferatu added another $2 million to its ever-growing total, now sitting at $166 million worldwide. Rogert Eggers’ latest is finally running out of steam after a straight up ridiculously great run. The rest of the top ten was dominated by holdovers, including Mufasa: The Lion King, surprise comedy breakout One of Them Days, Sonic the Hedgehog 3 and Moana 2.
Looking ahead in the realm of horror, we’ve got the acclaimed sci-fi thriller Companion hitting theaters this upcoming weekend to (hopefully) send January out on a high note. After that, the slasher Heart Eyes arrives on February 7, with Oz Perkins’ much-anticipated The Monkey due in theaters a couple of weeks later on February 21.
You can check out the full list of the top ten movies at the box office for the weekend of January 24, 2025, below. For more, check out Fango’s list of unconventional ghost stories.
- Flight Risk – $12 million (first weekend)
- Mufasa: The Lion King – $8.7 million (sixth weekend)
- One of Them Days – $8 million (second weekend)
- Sonic the Hedgehog 3 – $5.5 million (sixth weekend)
- Moana 2 – $4.3 million (ninth weekend)
- Presence – $3.41 million (first weekend)
- Wolf Man – $3.4 million (second weekend)
- A Complete Unknown – $3.1 million (fifth weekend)
- Den of Thieves 2: Pantera – $3 million (third weekend)
- The Brutalist – $2.8 million (sixth weekend)
