Ethan Coen's Drive-Away Dolls Is A Big Box Office Disappointment
This past weekend was sort of the calm before the storm at the box office, with "Bob Marley: One Love" sort of holding it down until "Dune: Part Two" arrives to help rescue 2024's abysmal ticket sales thus far. But a couple of new movies did hit theaters, with "Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba—To the Hashira Training" leading the way and maintaining the trend of anime finding its audience in theaters. Unfortunately, the weekend's other big new release, Ethan Coen's "Drive-Away Dolls," didn't fare nearly as well and now ranks as one of the year's early theatrical disappointments.
The film earned just $2.4 million in its debut, placing eighth on the charts just behind "Wonka" ($2.45 million), a film in its 11th weekend, and just ahead of "The Beekeeper" ($1.9 million), a film in its seventh weekend. The Focus Feature release is essentially dead on arrival as the next few weeks are going to be very busy, meaning this movie is probably going to drop out of the top 10 by Friday. It will be very lucky to clear $10 million domestically all told. That's not exactly what a studio wants when releasing a movie from one of the Coen Brothers. But one Coen brother is a different prospect, it seems.
This marks the first time that Ethan Coen has directed a movie solo (at least in terms of formal on-screen credits; he actually co-directed "Drive-Away Dolls" with Tricia Cooke, so he's still yet to truly go solo). With Joel Coen, he co-directed some stone-cold classic hits such as "No Country for Old Men" and "Inside Llewyn Davis." The duo decided to embark on separate projects several years back, with Joel Coen making "The Tragedy of Macbeth" for Apple.
A swing and a miss for Ethan Coen
"Drive-Away Dolls" follows Jamie (Margaret Qualley), a free-spirited woman who recently had a messy break-up with her girlfriend, and her far less outgoing friend Marian (Geraldine Viswanathan) who desperately needs to loosen up. Looking for a fresh start, they set out on a spontaneous road trip to Tallahassee. However, things quickly go awry when they cross paths with a group of criminals who want something they unwittingly drove off with. The ensemble cast also includes Beanie Feldstein, Colman Domingo, and Bill Camp, with brief appearances by Pedro Pascal and Matt Damon.
Critics and audiences have been lukewarm on "Drive-Away Dolls" (you can read /Film's review here). It currently holds a 66% critical approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes to go with a pretty rough 34% audience score. That doesn't bode well for word of mouth here. At best, Focus is going to have to hope that people are curious enough to check this one out at home. Luckily, the budget is said to be in the $20 million range, meaning it doesn't need to make a fortune to at least break even in the end.
For what it's worth, Focus has changed its business model a lot after the pandemic. The company relies a lot more on VOD to turn its films into hits these days, so this one may not be an outright flop for the studio. Be that as it may, it's certainly not doing much to help theaters this week. Unfortunately, this one is going to have to settle for potential cult status one day.
"Drive-Away Dolls" is in theaters now.