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Bullet Train Box Office Opens Strong But Far From $90 Million Budget
Brad Pitt's new action flick Bullet Train premiered on August 5 and boasted a strong box office opening, though it's still far from its $90 million budget. Bullet Train is an action comedy film featuring a star-studded cast including Pitt, Sandra Bullock, Logan Lehrman, Joey King, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Karen Fukuhara, and Brian Tyree Henry. The film follows Ladybug (Pitt), an experienced but very unlucky, assassin, hoping for a peaceful mission after too many prior gigs went sideways. However, things look equally bad for this mission as it places him among his most lethal enemies on a Japanese bullet train.
The film is an adaptation of the Japanese novel Maria Beetle by Kōtarō Isaka. While Bullet Train keeps the Japanese setting of the original novel, it did controversially cast many white actors as characters who were Japanese in the book. This led to Bullet Train being accused of whitewashing prior to its release. Now that the film has finally hit theaters, reactions continue to be pretty mixed. So far, it has a 54% on Rotten Tomatoes. It received praise for being action-packed and boasting a strong cast but was criticized for a storyline that gets lost in the over-stuffed film.
Now, as reported by Deadline, Bullet Train had a pretty strong box office opening. The film grossed $30.1 million over its opening weekend in the U.S., coming in at about $62.5 million worldwide. This $62.5 million opening is nothing to sneeze at and estimates predict that the film will make it to $100 million. However, its box office opening still leaves it a ways away from breaking even with its whopping $90 million budget.
Bullet Train's opening weekend isn't bad. However, it's definitely on a slower track, especially in comparison to other newly released films. For example, Jordan Peele's original film Nope grossed $44 million at the U.S. box office over its opening weekend. Meanwhile, Nope had a significantly lower budget of $68 million. However, a box office opening that is good, but not spectacular, is to be expected for a film like Bullet Train. While it boasts the cast, action, stunts, and budget to make its appearance glamorous, it doesn't have the franchise appeal that makes many action movies bankable in today's moviegoing landscape.
Bullet Train is a fun ride with relentless action, but it may not be strong enough to completely dazzle critically and commercially. Still, it boasted a nice opening, and its box office earnings are likely to surpass its $90 million budget. However, that big budget and the fact that Bullet Train is still a bit far from catching up to it, makes its commercial performance look a little less bright. Right now, it's still a bit too early to predict what the final result of Bullet Train's performance will be. For now, though, Bullet Train is sitting on a so-so box office opening performance amidst its big budget.
