Indie Specialized Box Office Chart: ‘Pinocchio: Unstrung’ Doesn’t Have the Same Pull as ‘Winnie the Pooh: Blood and Honey’

IndieWire each week exclusively shares a box office chart via Rentrak looking at the top 10 releases in specialized release, presented in full with added commentary. Remember when there was a wave of filmmakers all trying to make murderous Steamboat Willie horror movies because the character had entered the public domain? The director who started that trend of mining public domain IP for bloody adaptations and has proved most successful at it is back, and his film topped our specialized box office chart for the week. Director Rhys Frake-Waterfield’s latest film “Pinocchio: Unstrung” grossed $386K in its opening weekend from 500 screens, which is exactly the cutoff we look at in our specialized chart from Rentrak. That’s actually ahead of two movies Frake-Waterfield produced that play in the same children’s story horror wheelhouse, “Bambi: The Reckoning” and “Peter Pan’s Neverland Nightmare,” already surpassing what those films did in their domestic run and will surely top their worldwide totals ($408.8K and $1.6M, respectively). But it’s below the openings of both of Frake-Waterfield’s biggest hits, both “Winnie the Pooh: Blood and Honey” movies. The first “Blood and Honey” from 2023 opened to $652K and the sequel a year later opened to $533K, with each surpassing $7 million worldwide. This week was also dominated by new limited releases. Five of the Top 10 this week were opening in limited release, and that doesn’t even include a few new openings that only played a single screen, like MUBI’s “Rosebush Pruning,” TIFF documentary “A Life Illuminated,” and a drama called “Due West.” “Haunted Heist,” directed by Lil Rel Howery and starring Tiffany Haddish, opened on 373 screens and made $302K and placed #2. An Egyptian action comedy called “Take Care of Yourself” made $72K and finished #3. Neon’s “Sheep in the Box” from Hirokazu Kore-eda snuck into the Top 10 via just three screens, earning $31,450. And “Ueck,” a documentary about Milwaukee Brewers Hall of Fame broadcaster Bob Uecker, landed at #4 on our chart despite opening exclusively in Wisconsin via Marcus Theaters, earning $68,139. Meanwhile, other films like “Mary Oliver: Saved By the Beauty of the World,” “American Pachuco,” and the concert film “Jack Johnson: SURFILMUSIC” all continue to perform, the latter of which had another impressive weekend in its seventh week in theaters, grossing $28,135 to sneak in at #10. Top 10 Specialized Releases 7/24-7/26 (all figures are domestic results courtesy of Rentrak) “Pinocchio: Unstrung” – $386,468 Distributor: Viva Films Week: 1 Avg/Location: $773 Cumulative: $386,468 “Haunted Heist” – $302,543 Distributor: Variance Films/Saban Films Week: 1 Avg/Location: $811 Cumulative: $302,543 “Take Care of Yourself” – $72,282 Distributor: Go Media Week: 1 Avg/Location: $2,409 Cumulative: $72,282 “Ueck” – $68,139 Distributor: September Club Week: 1 Avg/Location: $4,008 Cumulative: $68,139 “Mary Oliver: Saved By the Beauty of the World” – $68,031 Distributor: Kino Lorber Week: 4 Avg/Location: $1,744 Cumulative: $293,679 “Maddie’s Secret” – $51,099 Distributor: Magnolia Week: 6 Avg/Location: $929 Cumulative: $1.1M “Reading Lolita in Tehran” – $44,127 Distributor: Greenwich Entertainment Week: 3 Avg/Location: $391 Cumulative: $70,120 “American Pachuco: The Legend of Luis Valdez” – $33,944 Distributor: mTuckman Media Week: 2 Avg/Location: $2,611 Cumulative: $43,048 “Sheep in the Box” – $31,540 Distributor: Neon Week: 1 Avg/Location: 10,513 Cumulative: $31,540 “Jack Johnson: SURFILMUSIC” – $28,135 Distributor: Evan Saxon Productions/Mercury Studios Week: 7 Avg/Location: $7,033 Cumulative: $92,294 IndieWire’s criteria for inclusion on the Specialized Chart looks at independent and mini-major distributors with films that at their widest release at any point are below 500 screens, excluding event cinema, re-releases, and major Bollywood or Chinese North American releases.