Apple’s F1 Movie Races past $400M at the Box Office
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Apple’s F1: The Movie quickly became Apple’s highest-ever opening weekend in theaters when it premiered in June, and it hasn’t shown any signs of slowing down. This weekend, earnings passed the $400 million mark, putting it on the list of Brad Pitt’s top five highest-grossing movies.
Apple hadn’t yet had a truly successful movie at theaters, and there had been rumblings that F1 would be the streamer’s last shot at box office success. However, the film performed well at the box office in its opening weekend, opening to an Apple record of $57 million in 3,661 theaters across the United States.
F1 opened internationally at the same time, adding another $89 million in earnings, for an estimated $146 million in global revenue. By the end of its initial 10-day run, the film had brought in $293 million globally, with $109 million coming from the US and Canada, and $72.9 million from the next five highest-grossing countries: $22 million from China, $17.3 million from the UK, $12.3 million from Mexico, $11.5 million from France, and $9.8 million from Australia.
With numbers like that, the film’s global box office was easily expected to surpass the $300 million mark by mid-July, and now it’s blown well past it: Box Office Mojo reports that the film is estimated to have grossed $434,527,641 worldwide at the time of this writing.
While most films experience a decline in box office numbers following their opening weekend, the three-day period from Friday to Sunday remains the most lucrative for any film.
F1 has seen its numbers slip each weekend, but it’s still doing steady business. Here are the numbers over its first three weekends of release in the US:
- First US weekend: $57,001,667
- Second US weekend: $25,781,267
- Third US weekend: $13,061,682
While the film’s earnings have dropped 50% each weekend in the United States (no global financial numbers have been announced), its numbers are still impressive, considering it continues to draw crowds to theaters. That’s even when facing off with the new Superman movie, which has so far brought in $194,383,462 in US box office sales alone (although the superhero movie has reportedly not done nearly as well internationally).
Now that F1 has crossed the $400 million checkpoint, let’s compare its numbers to the earnings of Brad Pitt’s most successful previous movies, adjusted for inflation:
- World War Z: $540,455,876
- Troy: $497,409,852
- Mr and Mrs Smith: $487,287,646
- Ocean’s Eleven: $450,717,150
- Once Upon a Time in Hollywood: $377,426,903
While the film’s box office numbers are good news for Apple, we still don’t know whether the movie is showing a profit as yet. While Apple hasn’t announced official budget numbers for the film, several industry insiders speculate that the film’s budget ranged from $200 million to $300 million to produce.
Keep in mind that Apple must share the box office revenue for the film with theater owners, and distribution and marketing costs for the movie have been reported to be as high as $50 million. However, some believe Apple has spent more than that promoting the film, possibly as much as another $100 million above the production costs.
Apple has reportedly been considering significantly reducing the number of big-budget tentpole movies it produces, although the racing film’s boffo box office could be changing some minds in Cupertino. Apple has also been reportedly looking at taking complete control of its film distribution. It had relied on Warner Bros for those services, meaning it had to share its profits with that studio.
If the standard industry belief that a film must earn 2.5 times its production budget to be considered profitable is true, F1 would require a $625 million take at the box office to make a profit.
However, thanks to Apple’s ownership of the film, there remains money to be made before F1 reaches the financial finish line. In addition to its theater box office earnings, Apple is likely to offer the film as a premium video-on-demand (PVOD) release, which will add to its earnings. Following PVOD availability, it will then be made available on Apple TV+, which is likely to result in increased subscriber numbers. There’s also the indirect benefit of Apple getting the rights to a lucrative new Formula One streaming package as a reward for promoting the sport.
All of these points suggest that F1 could become a profitable venture for Apple, although it remains to be seen just how profitable the film will ultimately prove to be.
