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By Peter Aitken
Politics Weekend Editor
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Emerald Fennell's controversial adaptation of Emily Brontë's seminal novel has scored a big win at the box office, ranking number one on Valentine's Day weekend in the face of deep criticism on social media.
The film, which stars Margot Robbie and Jacob Elordi, snagged $38.4 million in the U.S., although the film had projected to rake in around $50 million ahead of opening weekend, according to Variety. Divisive reviews, with the movie scoring 63 percent with critics on aggregator site Rotten Tomatoes, may have dampened some enthusiasm, but not enough to keep the film from dominating the weekend.
The number could rise to $40 million by the end of Monday, as holiday weekends include Monday box office in their totals.
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The film also hit $82 million globally, which matches the budget spent on the movie, putting it on a strong path to profitability depending on how it performs over the next few weeks. A film will normally see around 50 percent decline week-over-week, with rare exceptions for extremely positive word of mouth, such as in the case of Sinners and James Cameron's Avatar, or rave reviews driving public interest.
That makes the word-of-mouth impact on Fennell's film an interesting twist in an already roller coaster marketing campaign, although it still has major openings still ahead in Japan and Vietnam on February 27 and China on March 13 that could continue to drive the movie to massive success.
Ahead of release, Fennell faced criticism for casting Euphoria heart throb and Guillermo Del Toro's Frankenstein monster Elordi as Heathcliff, whom literary scholars have contended was written as a person of color. However, of the roughly dozen adaptations of the novel, the vast majority have cast a white actor as Heathcliff, including, famously, Laurence Olivier in the 1939 movie adaptation and Tom Hardy in a British TV adaptation in 2009.
Subsequent reviews of the film noted other departures from the novel, with Rotten Tomatoes writing in its consensus review that the movie "liberally" adapts the novel "with a heavy dose of carnality and chic stylization," making for "a visually vibrant pleasure." The film also boasts a soundtrack by pop singer Charli XCX, which released on Friday on music streaming platforms.
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The film, however, has scored 81 percent with audiences on Rotten Tomatoes, which, along with a very solid, if revised down, box office, indicates audiences find the allure of Robbie and Elordi much more compelling than literary fidelity.
Other films that released this weekend include the animated film GOAT, which took in $47.6 million globally, and Crime 101, which stars Chris Hemsworth and Mark Ruffalo and took around $27.1 million.
Fennell rose to fame as an actress, with roles in the films Anna Kerenina and The Danish Girl, and most prominently playing Camilla Parker Bowles in The Crown. She then made her directorial debut with the 2019 black comedy Promising Young Woman and followed up with Saltburn. She also served as the showrunner for season 2 of Killing Eve and provided the book for Andrew Lloyd Webber's Cinderella in 2021.
This article includes reporting by the Associated Press.
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