Taylor Swift may have been the talk of the town at the box office over the weekend, but not to be lost in the conversation is the star-making turn for Indy the dog. IFC’s much-hyped Good Boy hit theaters this past weekend which, for those who may not know, is a supernatural horror film from director Ben Leonberg that is shown pretty much entirely from the dog’s perspective. It turns out, audiences were into the idea.
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Good Boy opened to $2.2 million domestically on 1,650 screens, which was good enough to land at number nine on the charts. Taylor Swift’s The Official Release Party of a Showgirl led the weekend with $33 million. Meanwhile, Dwayne Johnson's The Smashing Machine disappointed with a $6 million opening. Good Boy might look like small potatoes by comparison but everything is relative. IFC is an indie distributor that relies far more on streaming and VOD for revenue. The bar is much lower for a very low-budget movie like this. Case in point, Bleecker Street’s Bone Lake also opened over the weekend and made a mere $828,560 despite a comparable marketing push. It’s hard to get people’s attention these days.
Leonberg’s feature directorial debut now ranks as IFC’s third-biggest opening ever behind this year’s Clown in a Cornfield ($3.6 million) and 2024’s Late Night With the Devil (2.8 million). That’s good company to be in.
The film centers on a loyal dog (played by Indy as himself) who moves to a rural family home with his owner Todd, only to discover supernatural forces lurking in the shadows. As these dark forces threaten Todd, the dog must bravely fight to protect the one he loves most. The cast includes Larry Fessenden, Arielle Friedman, Shane Jensen, Anya Krawcheck and Stuart Rudin.
This movie has been on an upward trajectory ever since it premiered at SXSW earlier this year. Good Boy has been met with rave reviews and that response actually managed to cut through the noise and get through to general audiences. Case in point, after the trailer received millions of views, IFC expanded the movie’s theater count for its opening weekend. Also working in its favor is the fact that we’re right in the heart of the Halloween season. With good word of mouth, this one could hang around for weeks to come.
Elsewhere, Lionsgate’s The Strangers: Chapter 2 fell pretty hard, dropping 52% for a $2.8 million second weekend. The sequel greatly disappointed on its opening weekend and things aren’t improving. Meanwhile, the Jordan Peele-produced HIM already fell out of the top ten on its third weekend with just $1.2 million. It will probably barely clear $25 million domestically. A swing and a miss.
Good Boy is in theaters now. For more, get the latest on the upcoming Grave Encounters reboot.
