‘No Time To Die’ produces stunning £25.9m opening to top UK-Ireland box office

GBP to USD conversion rate: 1.36

Universal’s James Bond blockbuster No Time To Die has produced a stunning £25.9m opening, including a £21m Friday-Sunday session to top the UK-Ireland box office, in a result that will be cheered across the chain of the film industry.

It is both the highest-grossing film of 2021, and since the pandemic began, after just four days in cinemas.

The £21m figure surpassed the three-day openings of the last two Bond titles – 2012’s Skyfall with £20.18m, and 2015’s Spectre with £19.98m. Those two films are currently the second and third-highest grossing of all time in the territory with £103.2m and £95.2m respectively, raising hopes that No Time To Die can achieve similarly stellar numbers. 

Playing in 772 locations, No Time To Die achieved an astonishing average of £27,231 per location. For comparison, Disney’s Shang-Chi And The Legend Of The Ten Rings – the previous highest opener of the year with £5.76m – took £9,011 per site.

No Time To Die dominated the box office, with 94% of total takings. Its success has contributed to the biggest ever October weekend for Imax across international territories; and Everyman Cinemas’ biggest ever weekend since the boutique chain was founded in 2000.

Further UK releases

There was space for holdover titles, with Disney leading the way with Shang-Chi And The Legend Of The Ten Rings. The film dropped 51% – a reasonable result in the context of Bond – to take £778,319, bringing its total to £19.7m from five sessions. It has now passed the totals of fellow Marvel titles Black Widow  and Captain America: The Winter Soldier, to sit 17 out of 25 Marvel Cinematic Universe films by total gross.

Free Guy fell a similar amount with a 52% drop, taking £270,266 for a £16.6m total from eight sessions; while Jungle Cruise dropped 45% with £73,162 for a £12.5m total.

Paramount’s PAW Patrol: The Movie was one beneficiary of increased footfall at cinemas this weekend, recording a strong 16% rise on its eighth weekend with £251,000 to bring its total to £8.16m.

The Many Saints Of Newark led Warner Bros’ slate this weekend, falling 62% on opening with £237,000 taking it to £1.6m. Space Jam: A New Legacy added £76,000 for £12.8m; Malignant put on £49,000 for £1.4m; while The Suicide Squad added £6,000 for £14.2m.

As well as Bond, Universal also had The Croods 2: A New Age adding £167,802 for £9.8m – a 10% rise on its previous session, and the fourth time it has increased takings across a long 12-week run. Further titles for the studio include Candyman, adding £120,228 for just short of £5m; Respect, adding £76,858 for just under £2m; Spirit Untamed with £42,247 for £3.4m; and People Just Do Nothing: Big In Japan with £5,501 for £2.3m.

Zee Studios’ Qismat 2, which scored the biggest-ever opening for a Punjabi film on its debut last weekend including previews, added £39,498 to reach £253,289.

Even Mice Belong In Heaven, one of the few new openers alongside No Time To Die, started with £17,318 from 228 locations, at an average of just £76.

Altitude released documentary Oliver Sacks: His Own Life on Wednesday, September 29, taking £14,091 on that day and £17,219 including encores.

Copshop added £2,400 for STX Entertainment and is up to £534,000; while Parkland Entertainment’s The Last Bus added £2,493 to hit £398,138, the distributor’s biggest result since it launched three years ago.

• No Time To Die: How UK cinemas are preparing for the belated launch of the 25th Bond film