Emma Stone's Poor Things Just Crossed A Major Box Office Milestone Ahead Of The Oscars
There has been a lot of bad box office news to go around in the first couple of months of 2024. That said, today brings a welcome little nugget, as Searchlight Pictures' "Poor Things" has officially crossed a pretty significant milestone. The film, which stars Oscar-winner Emma Stone ("La La Land") and was directed by Yorgos Lanthimos ("The Favourite"), has officially topped $100 million worldwide. That makes it one of the most successful Best Picture nominees, financially speaking, heading into Oscar night, which is a good sign for the future. It's also good for the present, so it's good all around.
"Poor Things" has now amassed $32.4 million domestically to go with $69.8 million internationally for a grand total of $102.2 million worldwide. Against a $35 million budget, that makes this a sizable hit and one that has benefited greatly in recent weeks from its several Oscar nominations, most notably that for Best Picture. When the nominations were first announced last month, the film had earned $34 million since arriving in limited release in early December. It has since added to that total rather substantially and has passed "The Favourite" ($95 million) as Lanthimos' highest-grossing movie, which is no small thing.
The only Best Picture nominees this year that have made more are "Barbie" ($1.44 billion), "Oppenheimer" ($960 million), and "Killers of the Flower Moon" ($156 million). But all three of those movies were made with much bigger budgets from higher-profile filmmakers and/or based on well-known pre-existing material, particularly "Barbie." Yes, "Poor Things" is based on a novel by Alasdair Gray, but it's not exactly big name IP. As a result, this essentially functions as an "original" movie in the eyes of the moviegoing public — one that has made its money based on good word of mouth (read /Film's review here), star power, and buzz from awards season. That's what we like to see.
Poor Things provides hope for non-franchise cinema
The film tells the story of Bella Baxter (Stone), a young woman brought back to life by an unorthodox scientist named Dr. Godwin Baxter (Willem Dafoe). Under Baxter's protection, Bella is eager to learn, but she runs off with Duncan Wedderburn (Mark Ruffalo), a slick and debauched lawyer. Free from the prejudices of her times, she quickly grows in her purpose to stand for equality and liberation. Stone, in addition to her starring role, serves as a producer.
In the pandemic era, there has been much concern over the survival of movies such as this. Even before the pandemic, Hollywood was trending ever further into not just franchise-first territory when it came to theatrical releases, but borderline franchise-only. Luckily, we've seen signs that audience tastes are changing, with the whole Barbenheimer phenomenon being one key piece of that puzzle. But we can even look at last year's Best Picture winner "Everything Everywhere All at Once" ($143 million worldwide) as a positive sign in this area as well.
The fact of the matter is that the Oscars do matter. Studios still invest in these sorts of movies in no small part because they hope to achieve the glory of major awards. But they still have to make financial sense on some level and, increasingly, it's been looking bleak on that front lately. However, movies like this are helping to change the narrative a bit. In turn, if movies that people care about and have actually seen are nominated, more people will likely tune into the Academy Awards. The health of the whole system is better as a result.
Let us also not forget that Disney now owns Searchlight Pictures (and the rest of Fox's former media assets). Movies like this succeeding theatrically not only ensures that Disney will continue to invest in them, but it also means they're less likely to be dumped directly to Hulu. It's good news all around.
"Poor Things" is in theaters now.