Oscar Isaac's New Movie Is A Surprisingly Big Box Office Hit
It was a surprisingly packed weekend at the box office, despite the fact that the previous weekend's champion, "A Minecraft Movie," managed to repeat atop the charts with another $80 million under its belt. At the same time, we had a handful of new movies opening this weekend including A24's war drama "Warfare," Rami Malek's action-thriller "The Amateur," and Blumhouse's new horror/thriller "Drop." However, it was an animated, faith-based movie starring Oscar Isaac ("Moon Knight," "Dune") that came out on top of the rest of the weekend's newcomers.
Angel Studios' "The King of Kings," an animated retelling of the story of Jesus based loosely on Charles Dickens' "The Life of Our Lord," opened to a bigger-than-expected $19.3 million domestically. That came very close to challenging "Sound of Freedom" ($19.6 million) for Angel's biggest opening weekend to date. That movie went on to become a word-of-mouth sensation, pulling in nearly $185 million domestically and more than $250 million globally.
The difference is that "Sound of Freedom" courted controversy on the road to success. "The King of Kings," on the other hand, has no controversy brewing. For the moment, it's a resounding success out of the gate that is poised to deliver crowds for weeks to come. Its opening weekend, which is already very good for a cheap animated movie with a relatively small marketing budget, is truly just the beginning. Not to get too ahead of ourselves here, but this might be a "sky's the limit" situation, if all goes well.
The King of Kings is just getting started
Directed by Seong-Ho Jang, "The King of Kings" centers on a father telling his son the story of Jesus Christ. Through his imagination, the boy walks alongside Jesus, witnessing his miracles, trials, and his ultimate sacrifice. Aside from Isaac as Jesus, the stacked voice cast also includes the likes of Pierce Brosnan ("Mobland"), Kenneth Branagh ("Tenet"), Uma Thurman ("Kill Bill"), Roman Griffin Davis ("Jojo Rabbit"), and Mark Hamill ("Star Wars"), among others.
The film was produced by the Korean company Mofac Studios, with Angel later picking up the distribution rights. While the production budget has yet to be revealed, it was far, far cheaper than the average Pixar film, that much is certain. It's probably closer to "The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim" ($30 million). That's very good news for all involved.
"The Passion of the Christ" ($611 million worldwide) remains the high bar for a faith-based movie, but this is now the biggest opening for an animated faith-based motion picture. What's more, "The King of Kings" earned an exceedingly rare A+ CinemaScore, something only 128 films have ever achieved. That's one of the best tools we have to indicate how well a movie will perform beyond opening weekend.
In this case, word of mouth is looking stellar. Not to mention that Easter weekend is coming up and this movie is well-positioned to be a big draw for moviegoers at that time. The needle is pointing up for "The King of Kings" one in a big, bad way. Religious audiences will turn up when they're catered to. Case in point, "The Chosen" franchise continues to be a lowkey box office hero, with both "The Chosen: Last Supper Part 3" and "Part 2" also in the top ten this past weekend. When all's said and done, this could wind up being one of the biggest surprises of 2025.
"The King of Kings" is in theaters now.