Summary
- Argylle opens No. 1 at the domestic box office with $18 million, but it is still a massive flop.
- Audiences were arguably let down because Henry Cavill only appeared briefly in the movie, which could have contributed to Argylle’s awful “C+” CinemaScore.
- This marked the second-worst weekend domestically of 2024 with a total of only $59.7 million.
It seems the adorable CGI cat in Argylle’s official trailer isn’t quite as cute as Universal Pictures would have liked. All levity aside, director Matthew Vaughn’s latest big-screen venture has more serious problems to worry about than that furry feline because the spy film flopped hard at the box office over its opening weekend. Even though the movie managed to take the No. 1 spot domestically with an estimated $18 million (per Box Office Mojo), it was hardly a win for Universal.
With a reported budget of $200 million, Argylle’s $18-million opening is hardly a drop in the bucket. Yes, Vaughn’s movie did pick up another $17.3 million internationally. But even with a global take of $35.3 million, Argylle is currently $165 million in the hole — and that doesn’t account for advertising and marketing costs.
And then there’s that horrible “C+” CinemaScore, which rates how audiences feel about a movie they’ve just seen when exiting theaters. For those cinephiles who watched the Argylle trailer, they saw plenty of Henry Cavill in the footage. However, the actor is hardly in the movie, which is actually led by Sam Rockwell and Bryce Dallas Howard. Sure, the convoluted storytelling and poor CGI obviously took its toll on moviegoers, but the absence of Cavill in the spy film may have been too much for audiences to get over.
Argylle: How the New Matthew Vaughn Film Connects to the Kingsman Movies
The end of Argylle teases a larger universe for the Matthew Vaughn film, and it’s not all that different from his Kingsman franchise.
2024’s Box Office Doldrum
Matthew Vaughn has ideas for an Argylle franchise, but the filmmaker is living in fantasy land if he really expects Universal Pictures to greenlight spin-offs, sequels or prequels of his box office flop. But it’s not just Vaughn’s Argylle that is suffering. As it turns out, this weekend was the second-worst grosser of 2024 with a domestic total of only $59.7 million. Last week (January 26-28) was the worst with $54.4 million.
Landing the No. 2 spot at the domestic box office this weekend is The Chosen Season 4: Episodes 1-3 with $6 million. Last weekend’s No. 1 film, The Beekeeper slips all the way down to No. 3 with $5.3 million. However, the Jason Statham-led action flick is still holding very well at the box office as it only fell 20.9% from last week’s numbers.
No. 4 goes to Wonka with $4.8 million, and the Warner Bros. prequel also held strong. Timothée Chalamet’s first go-round as the chocolate confectioner only dropped 15.8% from last weekend. And rounding out the Top 5 is the animated Migration with $4.1 million.
The Academy Award-nominated American Fiction (No. 8) and Poor Things (No. 9) remain in the Top 10 with $2.3 million and $2.1 million respectively at this weekend’s box office. And director Molly Manning Walker cracks the Top 25 as the critically acclaimed How to Have Sex opens in limited release (4 theaters) with a per-theater average of just over $13,000.
And check out the trailer for How to Have Sex, which currently registers 97% on the Tomatometer, below:
