Box office: F1 races to the top of the chart

Brad Pitt's car-race flick had one of the five best openings of any "original" movie this decade. Also: M3GAN 2.0 opened to only a fraction of what the first film opened to in 2023.

Sonny Hayes (Brad Pitt) and Joshua Pearce (Damson Idris) in F1.

A few of this week’s highlights:

• F1, starring Brad Pitt as a past-his-prime Formula One race-car driver, had one of the five best openings this decade of any film that wasn’t a sequel, a remake, or based on a comic book or video game.

• M3GAN 2.0 became the latest in a long string of underperforming Blumhouse productions, as it opened to a mere third of what the original M3GAN opened to two and a half years ago.

• Elio, which had the smallest first weekend of any Pixar film last week, had one of the steepest second-weekend drops of any “original” Pixar film this week.

• 28 Years Later, which had the biggest first weekend of any Danny Boyle film last week, had the steepest second-weekend drop of any Boyle film this week.

• Lilo & Stitch became the second movie this year to gross at least $400 million in North America (following A Minecraft Movie), while How to Train Your Dragon became the fifth to gross at least $200 million (following A Minecraft Movie, Lilo & Stich, Sinners, and Captain America: Brave New World).

And now, a few more stats and facts re: this week’s top ten, title by title: