‘Red One’ starts the year-end Tentpole Parade

It’s Dwayne Johnson and Chris Evans to the rescue.

At least that’s the hope as their new Christmas movie, The red oneopens across North America this weekend after a rough fall. Tracking suggests the action-adventure film will uncoil a domestic debut in the $30 million to $35 million range for Amazon MGM Studios before enjoying a long run through the end of the year (fingers crossed).

However, there will be plenty of talk about the film’s box office performance considering it cost $250 million to make. A major legacy studio in the same situation would come under intense scrutiny if a film with that price tag opened to those numbers, but Amazon insists its business model is completely different and driven by subscribers and not just the box office. It also hopes to launch a new film franchise.

And exhibitors are certainly happy to play the first proper Christmas movie since before the pandemic when The Grinch opened in 2018, not to mention a film with such high-profile talent.

Rated PG-13, the original story follows what happens when Santa Claus – codenamed “Red One” – is kidnapped and the North Pole’s security chief (Johnson) must team up with the world’s most notorious bounty hunter (Evans) in what Amazon MGM describes as a worldwide, action-packed mission to save Christmas.

Directed by Jake Kasdan from a screenplay by Chris Morgan and a story by Hiram Garcia, The red one also starring Lucy Liu, Kiernan Shipka, Bonnie Hunt, Kristofer Hivju, Nick Kroll, Wesley Kimmel and JK Simmons. It is rated PG-13 in the US, where reviews have not been kind.

The red one is the first in a series of year-end tentpoles gearing up to open and, if all goes well, put the box office back on the nice list after a rough fall due to a lack of product. November 22 was Universal’s Evil and the Paramounts Gladiator II both debut, followed by Walt Disney Animations Moana 2 on November 27 (Many have dubbed the high-profile corridor “Moanapocalypse” or “Glicked.)

Amazon MGM has run a full-fledged marketing campaign for The red oneincluding advertising major sporting events, coordinating an ambitious screening series and sending talent to locations around the world.

The studio also created a number of local campaigns to reach multicultural target groups. Amazon partnered with It’s Boba Time, a popular AAPI-owned boba company, in all 88 of their locations for two weeks and created a custom The red one-themed drink called “Missing Santa.” The studio partnered with five local Black-owned coffee shops and bakeries to host for free The red one drink giveaways to promote the film during its opening week. Locations included Hilltop in Los Angeles and Sip and Savor in Chicago. There were also activations in 13 stores in the Los Angeles area with a popular retailer in the Latin community, Curacao.

Warner Bros. Pictures is distributing the Seven Bucks production internationally, where it opened a week early to $28 million.

Amazon gave the green light to make The red one before it even bought MGM. Insiders say the film’s success will be based on global box office combined with how it performs on Prime this holiday season and in years to come as a perennial Christmas favorite.