Anne Hathaway is returning to a familiar spot — the top of box office charts — as “Verity” hits the big screen over the weekend. The adaptation of Colleen Hoover’s bestseller is targeting a solid domestic debut of $30 million to $35 million from 3,510 theaters, which should be enough to register as Hathaway’s third No. 1 opening of the year. She also starred in this summer’s blockbusters “The Devil Wears Prada 2″ and “The Odyssey.” In a twist that few might have predicted this time last year, “Verity” will tower over Tom Cruise and Alejandro González Iñárritu’s R-rated environmental satire “Digger,” which also debuts this weekend.
The big-budget film is shaping up to be one of the year’s biggest bombs, with opening weekend projections of $12 million to $15 million from 3,300 North American screens. Hoover’s film adaptations have modest budgets, making them low-risk bets for studios. Amazon MGM, a relative newcomer to theatrical, delivered its first major win in the spring with Ryan Gosling’s astronaut drama “Project Hail Mary,” which grossed $684 million globally.
Later this year, the studio has “I Play Rocky,” a crowd pleaser about the making of the 1976 Sylvester Stallone classic “Rocky,” and the heist thriller “How to Rob a Bank” with Nicholas Hoult and Pete Davidson. Hathaway, who also starred in this year’s psychodrama “Mother Mary” and sci-fi thriller “The End of Oak Street,” shares the screen in “Verity” with Dakota Johnson and Josh Hartnett. Directed by Michael Showalter (“The Big Sick”), the movie centers around famed author Verity Crawford, who gets badly injured in a car accident, leaving her husband to hire a struggling writer to complete the remaining books in the popular series.
Reviews have been mixed, with Variety’s Guy Lodge calling “Verity” a “listless” and “unintentionally funny tale.” “Digger” looks to continue a dismal year for Warner Bros. — having fielded such misfires as “The Bride!” and “Supergirl” — and the timing couldn’t be worse. Paramount’s acquisition of Warner Bros. is set to close next week. For Warners, it’s a stark reversal in fortunes from the studio’s 2025 slate, which boasted an unprecedented string of commercial triumphs including “Sinners,” “A Minecraft Movie” and “Weapons.” “Digger” was greenlit at Warner Bros. for $125 million, but according to four knowledgeable sources, the budget climbed to $160 million to $180 million after production went over schedule.
A Warner Bros. spokesperson disputes those figures. Box office experts say a movie of this size would need a debut near $40 million to justify its price tag. Cruise stars in “Digger” as a wealthy oil tycoon whose company causes a potential catastrophe.
Reviews and word-of-mouth have been so negative that Warner Bros. has started to embrace the bad press. In a new ad, the studio told moviegoers to “decide for yourself” after critics bashed the movie as “unpleasant” and “baffling.”
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