The War With Tenet: Deniro's Grandpa Movie Caps Nolan's Latest at the Box Office

photo courtesy Warner Bros.

With restrictions lifting all over the country, movie theaters are finally starting to slowly open. Still, nothing is normal as delayed releases and problematic films fill the void of bigger budget movies. Movie theaters will continue to struggle as they have to fill times in their cinemas with second and third run features and even resort to playing movies that have already released to streaming or the home video market in general. The Russell Crowe road rage flick is now playing screens across the country and The Empire Strikes Back has returned for its 40th anniversary. To say we're living in strange times would be a vast understatement. With Christopher Nolan's latest mind bending theatrical trip Tenet getting a staggered release over the last month or longer, it seems to be already running out of fuel at the box office. This is not what the director had intended. This would have been one of the big hits of the summer if not for the COVID-19 pandemic. Now, the movie looks to be defeated by a long delayed Robert DeNiro feature that has been laying on the back burner since 2018.

After the Weinstein case went to trial, the Home Alone rip off called The War With Grandpa was shelved. Now with folks heading back to the theater, it looks like they thought it was a perfectly timed window to get it into theaters. The movie opened this weekend with a small haul of $3.6 million which was enough to unseat Nolan from the number one spot. Tenet went on to gross just $2.1 million which brings its domestic tally to $48.3 million total. With its complete worldwide ticket sales, the movie has taken in $323.3 million which seems like a fair number considering the circumstances but would have made way more had it released during normal times. 

The film will drop blu-ray and 4K in just a couple months time which will help them recoup some more of the financial damage done to the movie's overall status but still is enough to cause long running repercussions for Warner Bros..

-CG