• by Wayne Friedman , Yesterday

Amazon-MGM’s “Project Hail Mary” -- an original, non-sequel movie -- blasted off to a massive $80.6 million in its opening weekend, according to Comscore.

The science-fiction adventure film, starring Ryan Gosling in the leading role -- expected to deliver between $50 million and $60 million -- became the top-grossing domestic movie of the year so far. 

“Hail Mary” becomes the second only non-sequel original movie to post a $80 million-plus opening in the last decade. The first was Warner Bros.' "Oppenheimer" in summer 2023.

Audiences and critics gave the movie high marks -- An 'A" grade from CinemaScore (from audiences) and 95% from Rotten Tomatoes (from critics).

That carried a lot of weight, considering that Amazon-MGM spent a relatively average $16.0 million in national TV advertising for its entire campaign to date, according to estimates from iSpot.

The movie took advantage of highly viewed programming including the “2026 Milan Cortina Olympics,” NBA basketball and college basketball as well as “The Oscars” and "Good Morning America." 

For the year so far, the big opening for “Hail Mary" has, on a season-to-date basis, pushed domestic box-office revenue up 20% versus a year ago to $1.52 billion, according to Box Office Mojo.

Looking at national TV advertising spend for all theatrically released movies domestically this year, studios/producers have spent $236.7 million (13.4 billion impressions and 36,811 airings) versus $214.2 million a year ago (14.3 billion impressions and 57,163 airings ).

This year so far, Universal Pictures is the biggest advertiser in paid advertising and media value, at $50.5 million.

Second place to “Hail Mary” in box office is Walt Disney’s “Hoppers” (in its third week of release) at $18 million. Moviegoers Entertainment’s “Dhurandhar: The Revenge" (The Revenge” is next at $10.0 million.