THB# 201: Bullet Train & How We Rotten

What Does A Rotten Tomato Score Really Mean?

Bullet Train opens… slowly…

Estimates range from $25 million to $30 million. Not terrible for an original R-rated action movie.

Brad Pitt is not a big opening guarantee, particularly in America. He’s had 8 films as a lead in his career that opened to $30 million or more. 3 Oceans, 2 Quentins, Mr. & Mrs. Smith, Troy, Interview With The Vampire, and his #1 opener, 2013’s World War Z.

So this is actually a good number for opening a Brad Pitt movie. Love the co-starring cast here, but they aren’t Tom Cruise, or Angelina Jolie at her height and in a romance with Pitt, or part of a $200m+ epic from the too-forgotten Wolfgang Petersen, or a load of zombies threatening the world.

Nonetheless… it feels light.

Jordan Peele is a bigger opener than Pitt right now and he got “the sky is falling”ed for Nope opening to $44 million. Let’s go back to 2019, when US was the only original action film to open over $30 million. 2018… you have 4 clustered between $35 million and $50 million openings (Rampage, Ready Player One, The Meg, and A Quiet Place).

Still, 5 in those 2 years would still mark them as a rarity.

If it turns out the final is $25 million, the comps will be uglier. But I’m just saying, our sense of perspective and the hopes that Bullet Train would be the last big hot movie of the summer skew perception.

But what really caught my eye this morning was another skewed perception.