Meet the Movies Searching for Sleeper Hit Status in the Shadow of ‘Avatar’

This holiday box office season will be defined by James Cameron’s “Avatar: Fire and Ash,” but a healthy box office never comes from one film alone. This weekend also sees a trio of movies that theaters hope will provide secondary support on the charts both in their openings and in the Christmas period to come.

“Avatar” may have four-quadrant appeal, but when the series’ second installment “The Way of Water” came out three years ago, it did not end up being a black hole that sucked up any interest in other films. Universal/DreamWorks’ “Puss in Boots: The Last Wish” found sleeper hit success in the shadow of the Na’vi with with $186 million domestic and $480 million worldwide. It stands behind only “Kung Fu Panda 4” as DreamWorks Animation’s second-highest grossing film of the past five years.

Reaching those heights might be too much to ask from this year’s batch of competitors, but given their lower production and marketing spends, they can still be theatrical successes for their respective studios. Let’s break them down.

“The Housemaid”

Paul Feig’s adaptation of Freida McFadden’s juicy beach book thriller “The Housemaid” is a key one for Lionsgate. With the solid runs of “The Long Walk” ($62.8 million worldwide) and “Now You See Me: Now You Don’t” ($213 million worldwide), the studio is slowly starting to become a substantial player in the theatrical space again after a terrible 2024 and a slow rebuild over much of 2025.

“The Housemaid” is the film that Lionsgate hopes will be the firm No. 2 moneymaker behind “Avatar” as an alternative for a primarily female audience. The film stars Sydney Sweeney and Amanda Seyfried as a live-in maid and her wealthy employer who become embroiled in a turbulent mess of violence and domestic abuse at the latter’s luxurious Long Island estate.

The film has been well received with an 80% Rotten Tomatoes score and is likely to get sterling audience scores from fans of Sweeney and Seyfried as well as McFadden’s book. Currently, it is projected for an opening weekend of at least $25 million.

From there, Lionsgate is hoping that Feig’s gripping narrative and the tension between his two leads will encourage moviegoers who are unfamiliar with the novel to give it a try. Along with movies like the arthouse historical drama “The Testament of Ann Lee” — also starring Seyfried — and A24’s provocative Oscar contender “Marty Supreme,” moviegoers looking for something more mature and intense than the sci-fi escapism of “Avatar” will have plenty of options during the holidays.

But don’t be surprised if the No. 2 film this weekend behind “Avatar” doesn’t come from Hollywood, but from Provo…

“David”

At CinemaCon in 2024, Angel Studios made its debut at the movie theater trade show with a presentation that was capped off with “David,” an animated adaptation of the famed Old Testament epic about the shepherd who would become the King of Israel. The film was set for release on Thanksgiving weekend, setting up a potential showdown against the Goliath that is Disney’s “Zootopia 2.”

But those plans were scuttled when “David” producers Slingshot Pictures terminated its distribution agreement with Angel in October 2024 and filed a breach of contract lawsuit five months later.

That lawsuit was settled two months ago as part of a $78 million deal between Slingshot, Angel and 2521 Entertainment that would see Angel get back distribution rights to “David” as well as a five-part animated streaming series, with the Utah indie studio reportedly providing 40% of that $78 million at approximately $31 million.

With that settlement, “David” is back on the release slate with a December date that, in the long run, might prove to be a far better launch point than Thanksgiving. Instead of having its word-of-mouth stifled by the wildly popular “Zootopia 2,” “David” will be able to take advantage of the holiday corridor to leg out among faith-based audiences who turned out in droves this past spring for Angel’s animated Gospel adaptation, “The King of Kings.”

Already, “David” looks like it will outperform the $60.2 million domestic total of “The King of Kings,” having already racked up $15 million in presales with similar independent projections to “The Housemaid” of a $25 million opening.

For “King of Kings” and Angel Studios’ calling card hit “Sound of Freedom,” both films found traction from strong word-of-mouth but got an extra boost from faith-based and conservative moviegoers trying to send a message with their wallets about what they want to see in theaters.

As Angel continues its quest to establish itself as a constant presence at the box office, “David” will be a key test as it tries to find a higher level of consistent grosses and establish a unique lane in the faith-based space with animated theatrical offerings.

“The Spongebob Movie: The Search for SquarePants”

For the fourth time, the sponge who lives in a pineapple under the sea is getting a Paramount feature film. But “The Search for SquarePants” is the first time in 10 years that SpongeBob is in theaters as his third feature, “Sponge On the Run,” was moved to streaming during the COVID-19 pandemic.

With that in mind, are today’s kids as excited to see Spongebob on the big screen more than a quarter-century after his Nickelodeon debut? While we won’t have an answer to that for weeks, forecasts have “Search for SquarePants” tracking for an $18 million opening.

Certainly there will be some eyebrows raised if “David” does indeed launch higher than a film with one of the most recognizable cartoon characters of the 21st century, but remember that the core audiences for these films are different, even if they both involve families.

While the core audience for “David” might be more motivated to see the film early because of the aforementioned “vote with your wallet” factor, families more interested in “SpongeBob,” as was the case with family holiday films like “Puss in Boots 2” and Disney’s “Mufasa,” aren’t rushing to see it before Christmas. Given their starkly different tones and source material, there’s more than enough room for “SpongeBob” and “David” to leg out without cannibalizing each other’s core base.

If projections are correct, “Search for SquarePants” won’t come close to the $162 million domestic run of the last “SpongeBob” film in theaters, “Sponge Out of Water,” back in 2015. Given that a whole generation of kids has passed since then, that is to be expected. Over the next few weeks, we will see how well SpongeBob, Patrick, Squidward and the rest of the Bikini Bottom gang have endeared themselves to Gen Alpha after winning two previous generations of kids before them.

As a new film division leadership headlined by Dana Goldberg and Josh Greenstein gets settled in at Paramount, you can bet they will be watching to see how much drawing power Nickelodeon’s most popular franchise still has with today’s kids.

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