Alex Garland’s Civil War, starring Kirsten Dunst, took first place at the US box office, despite being an independent, medium-budget film from A24. In Italian cinemas from 18 April.
Civil War with Kirsten Dunstin our cinemas from April 18has already been released in USA and recorded a record-breaking first weekend at the box officeboth for study A24 who produced it, and for the director Alex Garland. It should be underlined that we are not talking about numbers comparable to those of blockbuster films, but since it is a medium budget independent filmspectacular but also complex in the themes covered, the result is interesting.
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Civil War, the box office numbers for the American debut
There is Kirsten Dunst in the role of a reporter, however Civil War it’s not the typical, average action movie you would expect from Hollywood: the director and screenwriter Alex Garland in fact he wanted to talk about today’s social turmoilimagining a new American civil war, while avoiding Manichaeisms. In history it is hypothesized that in the near future the democratic California and the Republican Texastogether with the Alliance of Floridateam up to try to overthrow a fascist president by force, now in his third term. A small group of journalists is moving towards Washington DC precisely to interview the latter, among various dangers.
There is no talk of a blockbuster from a major studio, but A24 has allocated a budget around 50 million dollars for the film: it is a type of “average” production not too loved by studios, who prefer to bring small, low-cost films to glory, or focus on large productions linked to sagas and universes, worth around 200 million per title. Against all odds, Civil War recorded $25,713,000 (source Boxoffice Pro) in the first three days of programming in the USA, exceeding ten million Godzilla and Kong: The New Empire, when analysts were predicting a head-to-head. This figure makes it the highest debut of a film by the British auteurand at the same time a record debut for an A24 film: the studio is only twelve years old, it has brought home successes such as Everything Everywhere All at Once, but had never allocated such a high budget. The possibility that Civil War will reach and exceed $100 million in worldwide grosses, breaking even and confirming the validity of the bet, is very real. Considering how much the film’s contents are causing discussion, it is a sign of vitality for a cinema halfway between authorship and genre entertainment (16.5% of revenues came from theaters IMAX).
