Warner Bros’ Black Adam is this weekend’s widest UK-Ireland release, playing at 664 sites.
Spanish filmmaker Jaume Collet-Serra reunites with Jungle Cruise star Dwayne Johnson for this latest outing from the DC Extended Universe, that follows a Middle Eastern slave who is transformed into a god, with Sarah Shahi, Aldis Hodge, Noah Centineo and Pierce Brosnan also starring.
DC’s 2022 releases kicked off with The Batman in March, a record wide release for Warner Bros, playing at 709 locations. It took £13.5m in its opening weekend. DC League Of Super-pets also took the top spot on its release in August, taking £2.6m in its opening weekend.
DC’s superhero rival Marvel has also displayed impressive opening weekends at the box office this year - Doctor Strange In The Multiverse Of Madness opened in May to £14.9m from 685 locations. Thor: Love And Thunder took £9.1m from 696 locations for Disney in July.
The second widest release this weekend is Searchlight Pictures’ The Banshees Of Inisherin, opening at 550 sites. Martin McDonagh’s highly anticipated latest feature – his first since 2017’s Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri – premiered at Venice and reunites McDonagh with In Bruges duo Colin Farrell and Brendan Gleeson. The dark comedy is set in a remote part of Ireland in the 1920s, and follows the unravelling of a lifelong friendship between two local men. It scooped both the best screenplay prize for McDonagh and the best actor prize for Farrell at Venice, with plenty of buzz around it already for awards season.
Kaleidoscope has Mia And Me: The Hero Of Centopia out at 400 locations from Saturday (October 22). The family animation is based on TV series Mia And Me, and follows a young girl who as she is transported through the power of an ancient book into the troubled land of Centopia.
Streaming titles playing in cinemas this weekend include Amazon’s My Policeman, which plays in around 60 locations ahead of its release on Prime Video on November 4. The Toronto premiere is directed by Michael Grandage, stars Harry Styles and Emma Corrin, and is a 1950s-set forbidden love story. Netflix has crime drama The Good Nurse, also a Toronto premiere, in under 25 cinemas, ahead of its Netflix release on Wednesday (October 26). It’s the first English-language feature from Danish director Tobias Lindholm and is headlined by Eddie Redmayne and Jessica Chastain.
Foreign-language titles
Park Chan-wook’s Cannes’ premiere Decision To Leave – which also played at Toronto and BFI London Film Festival – is debuting for Mubi at 113 locations. The South Korean neo-noir follows a homicide detective who falls for a potential suspect.
Polish comedy drama Gdzie Diabel Nie Moze, Tam Baby Posle, is playing at 103 sites for Magnetes Pictures. It is directed by Heathcliff Janusz Iwanowski, is set in 1980s and follows a group of entrepreneurial friends as they make their millions.
Somalia’s first ever Oscar submission, Cannes premiere The Gravedigger’s Wife, is being released by Aya Films at 17 sites this weekend, with more to follow in the following weeks, bringing its overall total to 53. It is the directorial debut of Finnish-Somali filmmaker Khadar Ayderus Ahmed and marks the first time a fully Somali-language feature has been released in UK cinemas.
Helsinki premiere Big Vs Small is playing for Tull Stories at five sites this weekend, with more to be added in the following weeks. The Portuguese, Finnish and English-language documentary follows a Portuguese surfer attempting to conquer her greatest fear – drowning.
Further foreign-language features out this week are Ann Hu’s bilingual drama Confetti, released by Miracle Comms this weekend in under 25 sites, about a determined mother who moves from rural China to New York in the hope of finding a special education programme for her dyslexic daughter; and Telugu-language fantasy comedy Ori Devuda, distributed by DJ Tech.
In the documentary space, realist painter Edward Hopper is the subject of Hopper: An American Love Story, directed by Phil Grabsky, in which the artist re-evaluates his life and legacy. Seventh Art has the film in 13 locations across the weekend, with an additional four on Monday.
Signature is playing dystopian sci-fi Vesper in 12 sites. The Karlovy Vary premiere is directed by Lithuania’s Kristina Buozyte and France’s Bruno Samper. The English-language title follows a 13-year-old girl who must use her survival skills to make sure she and her ailing father remain alive after the collapse of the world’s ecosystem.
In re-releases, Park Circus will be playing a 40th anniversary 4K restoration of Tobe Hooper’s Poltergeist at 311 sites.
In event cinema, Trafalgar Releasing has Metropolitan Opera Medea at 153 sites, including a live broadcast on Saturday (October 22) and delayed live screenings. Encore screenings will also run from Sunday (October 23) of Puccini’s opera La Bohème, following its live transmission on Thursday (October 20) from Covent Garden’s Royal Opera House.
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