Warner Bros. Notches Another Box Office Win. ‘One Battle After Another’ Tops Sales.

Warner Bros. has had a string of top box office debuts this year, notching its ninth this weekend. (Eric Thayer/Bloomberg)

Key Points

• Warner Bros. secured its ninth number one movie debut this year with “One Battle After Another,” earning $22.4 million domestically.
• “One Battle After Another” achieved a global opening weekend total of $48.5 million, including $7.5 million from IMAX ticket sales.
• The total domestic box office for the year reached $6.56 billion, a 4.2% increase compared to the same period in 2024.

Warner Bros. landed another hit theatrical debut this weekend, taking the top spot in domestic box office sales with One Battle After Another, its ninth No. 1 movie premiere this year.

One Battle After Another sold an estimated $22.4 million domestically, putting Warner Bros. on pace to meet or beat its previous record of 10 top-of-the-charts movie debuts in 2011, according to Comscore. The weekend showing tied the nine top debuts it had in 2009, more than any other studio this year.

The movie is a crime thriller about a group of ex-revolutionaries starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Sean Penn, Benicio Del Toro, and Regina Hall. Written, directed, and produced by Paul Thomas Anderson, it sold another $26.1 million internationally, for a total estimated global opening weekend of $48.5 million. One Battle After Another also topped the global IMAX charts, with $7.5 million in global IMAX ticket sales.

Warner Bros., the studio unit of Warner Bros Discovery , also took the fourth-place spot on the domestic movie charts, with the horror thriller The Conjuring: Last Rites scaring up another $12.95 million its third weekend, for a domestic cumulative total of $151.2 million through Sunday, and a global cumulative sales of $435.9 million, Comscore said.

“Warner Brothers has been on an incredible hot streak ever since the debut of A Minecraft Movie …, that then led into the incredible success of Sinners, and a seemingly unstoppable lineup of films throughout the summer and now into the fall corridor,” Comscore senior media analyst Paul Dergarabedian told Barron’s.

A Minecraft Movie, the live-action movie based on the best-selling video game of all time, obliterated expectations when it opened on April 4 and scored a $162.8 million opening weekend. It remains the year’s biggest movie, with more than $423.9 million in domestic box office, and worldwide ticket sales of $957.8 million, according to BoxOfficeMojo.

“Warner Bros. has always been a filmmaker-centric studio, as seen in their support of directors over the years, from Stanley Kubrick to Clint Eastwood, Denis Villeneuve, and Greta Gerwig, and this continues with Paul Thomas Anderson,” Dergarabedian added.

“After a quiet first quarter for the company, they’ve been on a roll,” he said, with a string of hits “that will be viewed as a blueprint for how to realize a near-perfect box office year.”

Dergarabedian said it was somewhat unprecedented to see one studio dominate the number one position so many times in a single year. In comparison, he said Walt Disney Studios has had five No. 1 films this year; Universal Pictures has had three; Lionsgate has had two; and Sony Pictures and Netflix have each had one.

Comcast’s studio, Universal Pictures, scored second place in the weekend box office with the debut of Gabby’s Dollhouse: The Movie, a G-rated family adventure based on the animated preschool series. It sold $13.7 million domestically and another $5.5 million internationally for $19.2 million in global sales.

In third place, Crunchyroll/Sony Pictures’ animated fantasy adventure Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba Infinity Castle, the first in a three-party anime shonen trilogy from animation studio Ufotable, sold $7.1 million in its third weekend for a domestic cumulative take of $118.2 million.

Lionsgate’s The Strangers: Chapter 2, opened in fifth place with a $5.9 million domestic debut. The R-rated horror mystery about three masked strangers terrorizing a stranded couple at a remote Airbnb , is a sequel to last year’s The Strangers: Chapter 1, which sold $48.2 million worldwide, according to BoxOfficeMojo.

This weekend’s estimated $76 million in total domestic box office pushes Hollywood’s year-to-date total to $6.56 billion through Sunday, or 4.2% higher than at this point in 2024, Comscore said.

October’s lineup is also full, Dergarabedian said. A24’s The Smashing Machine, a biographical drama about mixed-martial arts and UFC champion Mark Kerr that was written, directed, co-produced, and edited by Benny Safdie, and starring Dwayne Johnson, opens on Friday, Oct. 3. Focus Features’ psychological drama Anemone, starring Daniel Day-Lewis, also opens on Friday.

Lionsgate’s Kiss of the Spider Woman, a drama musical starring Jennifer Lopez and Diego Luna, opens Oct. 11. Ethan Hawke stars in two films opening on Oct. 17: Sony Pictures’ biographical drama Blue Moon and Universal Pictures’ horror film Black Phone 2. And Focus Features’ Bugonia, a sci-fi crime thriller starring Emma Stone, opens on Oct. 24.

Write to Janet H. Cho at janet.cho@dowjones.com