David Leitch’s late-summer event pic ‘Bullet Train’ stars Brad Pitt, topped the North American box office chart with an estimated weekend haul of $30.1 million, including a Friday haul of $12.6 million.
Overseas, the R-rated pic earned an impressive $32.4 million for a global start of $62.4 million.
Brad Pitt leads a star-packed cast in this tale of an assassin roaming a high-speed Japanese bullet train. Other names on the marquee include Joey King, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Brian Tyree Henry, Andrew Koji, Hiroyuki Sanada, Michael Shannon and Sandra Bullock.
The movie opened in line with expectations following an aggressive marketing campaign on Sony’s part. Critics haven’t exactly embraced Bullet Train, which currently holds a 53 percent critics’ score on Rotten Tomatoes. Audiences bestowed the film with a B+ CinemaScore.
Bullet Train is the last major studio offering of the summer, putting increased pressure on the movie’s performance. Generally, the summer box office season lasts until Labor Day, but delays due to the pandemic continue and studios are seeing some of their films delayed in postproduction.
The weekend’s other new offering is Jay Chandrasekhar’s comedy Easter Sunday, starring stand-up comedy sensation Jo Koy as a struggling actor and comedian who attends a raucous holiday meal with his Filipino family.
Easter Sunday opened to an estimated $5.2 million, likewise in line with expectations. Asian moviegoers made up more than 35 percent of ticket buyers, according to PostTrak.
Jimmy O. Yang, Tia Carrere, Brandon Wardell, Eva Noblezada, Lydia Gaston, Asif Ali, Rodney To, Tiffany Haddish and Lou Diamond Phillips star in the Universal film, which came in No. 5.
Elsewhere in the top 10, DC League of Super Pets tumbled 51 percent to an estimated $11.2 million for a 10-day domestic total of $45.1 million.
