Backrooms looks set for a big $60M+ breakout; Obsession hopes to continue to stun while Mandalorian tests its legs

A few months ago, $50M would have been a great final domestic total for the Kane Parsons directed movie, but now feels increasingly likely to be the opening weekend floor. For a movie that started as a short YouTube video inspired by a 4Chan liminal spaces post, that’s genuinely monumental and sends a very clear message to Hollywood: audiences want young, fresh talent telling new stories instead of solely relying on legacy sequels. The 20 year-old is about to shatter A24’s opening weekend record, currently held by Civil War’s $25M, which it should more than double on its way to also becoming the best grosser ever and their first movie to break $100M domestic (current record holder is Marty Supreme at $96M).

We were looking at Talk to Me as a potential comparison a few months back. Also from A24, it opened to $10.4M on its way to $48M, a total that Backrooms should pass just in its opening weekend. Weapons was a smash last year opening to $43.5M and finaling at $151.6M, but Backrooms should open bigger than even that. To be conservative and as a good reminder — anything over $25M should be considered a breakout success here, so if Backrooms “merely” ends up in the $40M–$50M range instead of closer to $60M, that’s still a huge unqualified success. Look for $60M+ this weekend, with $70M even looking possible.

Back to Mandalorian: the Star Wars spinoff will head into its second weekend at ~$115M. Expect a bigger drop thanks to Memorial Day last weekend, probably in the 65% to 70% range. Solo: A Star Wars Story is the closest comp by every dimension, including the exact same Memorial Day launch slot, and that fell -65% in its second frame on the way to a soft 2.5x leg. A similar drop is the realistic ceiling here. It’s still tracking towards a final domestic total over $200M, unless it lands closer to a 70% drop this weekend.

Obsession is the holdover story of the year so far. Focus Features’ psychological horror is at $67.9M through 12 days on a 3.9x multiplier, after a +30% second weekend that no horror release in recent memory has matched at that scale. Midweeks so far have been incredibly strong too, at essentially the same level as Mandalorian and actually ahead of it Wednesday — with an insane +50% jump from last Wednesday and was actually up from Discount Tuesday too.

This isn’t just a great run; it’s one for the all-time record books. Finding anything similar in this genre is incredibly hard. Sinners might be a good comparison, even if it played at a higher level from the start with a $48M opening. That one barely dropped in weekend 2 (just 6%) and ended up with 5.8x legs, which Obsession will beat even if it won’t match the domestic total (Sinners ended up at a huge $278M). This weekend Backrooms offers direct competition, which for horror is often a death sentence, but not for Obsession. Expect another incredibly strong hold over $20M as it looks set to eventually coast past $150M to become Focus Features’ highest domestic grosser of all time, a record currently held by Downton Abbey at $96M, or Coraline at $116M if you include the re-release. Obsession even has an outside shot at taking #2 away from Mandalorian this weekend, which would be a huge upset.

Michael rolls into its sixth frame with $350M domestic locked as the Japan launch aims to lift the global ceiling toward $1B. Expect another $13M or so this weekend taking it to around $342M. The Devil Wears Prada 2 is at $201.3M through 26 days, a great total, but with legs that have been below average. What could have been $250M+ is looking likely to end up around $230M or so instead.

Focus Features’ Pressure is the adult-drama play of the weekend with Brendan Fraser, Andrew Scott with a stage-play adaptation of the 72 hours before D-Day. There’s a ton of competition with Obsession and Backrooms both overperforming and Mandalorian, Michael and DWP2 still all pulling solid numbers too. The single-digit range is looking the most likely outcome — something in the $5–9M range as it gets squeezed out of theaters by the bigger plays.

The wild card is Sony / TriStar’s The Breadwinner, Nate Bargatze’s wide-release film debut in a PG family comedy opposite Mandy Moore. This is a hard one to predict, but it could flirt with double digits if everything goes right. We’ll see what this one pulls, anything between $4M and $10M is possible.