Box Office: ‘Tenet’ Nabs Soft $9M Friday In China As ‘Eight Hundred’ Nears $325M

Tenet began its Chinese theatrical engagement Friday with a frankly underwhelming $8.44 million. The much-anticipated Chris Nolan spy actioner, which “officially” opened in America on Thursday after three nights of previews, earned good but not great word-of-mouth from paying Chinese audiences. For now the problem is less word-of-mouth and more a “mere” (counting previews) $8.95 million Friday gross. The film was expected/hoped to open closer to $50 million but now will likely open closer to $25 million-$30 million. While legs are possible, it now needs better-than-normal (for a Hollywood release in China) legs. Unlike America and much of the world, it’s going to have lots of competition.

The Eight Hundred earned $8.3 on Friday, meaning it will likely win the weekend over Tenet. Mulan will open in China on September 11, while Avatar will get a reissue on September 18. Avatar may make enough (around $7.5 million) to surpass Avengers: Endgame’s $2.8 billion global gross and take back the title of “world’s biggest-grossing movie.” It might also put the hurt on both Mulan and Tenet if Chinese audiences prefer the devil they know (which grossed $200 million way back in 2009) over the devil they don’t. Jackie Chan’s newest actioner, Vanguard, opens in China on September 30 along with a handful of other local titles in September.

That’s not to argue doom-n-gloom, as the Nolan picture opened to a surprisingly robust $53.6 million overseas last week (pretty close to the overseas launch of Dunkirk during more normal times) and could accidentally set a new Labor Day weekend record (Halloween grossed $30.5 million over its Fri-Mon debut in 2007) via is slightly delayed American launch. Tenet earning $30 million for the weekend and maybe $60 million total in China would be fine had the movie been otherwise playing under normal circumstances worldwide. That Interstellar earned $122 million in 2014 (one of the biggest Hollywood exports ever at the time) didn’t mean that Tenet would automatically play likewise.

The Dark Knight Rises, Dunkirk (which also earned around $8.5 million on opening day) and Inception earned between $52 million and $68 million in China respectively. The Dark Knight didn’t play in China allegedly due to governmental displeasure over the film’s Chinese crime boss. Beyond expectations and potentially false hope created by the $18 million-grossing reissue of Interstellar (Inception opened in China last weekend with just $3 million) and the ridiculous success of The Eight Hundred ($318 million-and-counting), a disappointment isn’t a disaster. WB is only going to get around 25% of the gross. The difference between $60 million and $150 million is $20 million extra for the studios.

The word-of-mouth (8.4 from Douban, compared to 8.9 for Interstellar and 9.3 for Inception) is merely okay. If Tenet doesn’t break out in China this weekend, it could just be that they didn’t love the movie and thus it wasn’t a must-see release. Yes, that would be disappointing. China is a territory where Nolan’s original actioners have performed better than his Dark Knight movies, implying that Nolan is big in China despite his Batman movies, not (initially at least) because of them. For all the talk about Tenet saving cinemas, China is the one marketplace, partially thanks to The Eight Hundred ($324 million in 15 days) that has already saved itself.