When we talk to Bob Odenkirk before last year’s Toronto International Movie Festival, the star of “Normal” was clear about his ambitions to continue making more action movies with “John Wick” writer Derek Kolstad. Although there’s still an audience for a generic beat-em-up movie, he said, he’s interested in doing something deeper.
“There’s a typical action story you can tell that will satisfy the audience, I get that. I get that there’s an audience out there, and I don’t want to name names, but you don’t have to because you can conjure them up effortlessly.” Odenkirk previously told IndieWire. “There’s a kind of movie that, if you make it and it looks satisfying, it will appeal to its audience. But I’m always trying to find something else, find something else in the form, smuggle in something more than the accepted values of that genre.”
Trying to go beyond genre norms may have proven a challenge for his new film “Normal,” which Magnolia opened this weekend with a modest domestic haul of $2.65 million, seventh place for the weekend.
Magnolia took “Normal” further than any film it has ever released, opening on just over 2,000 screens. Odenkirk and company had even been talking about a sequel. It’s being positioned as a more traditional commercial action movie with that big push, and with an estimated per-screen average of just $1,286, audiences may not have seen it that way.
The number of screens he committed to emphasizes the strength Magnolia saw in “Normal.” In many cases, reserving as many screens as possible is simply a function of them being available. Even with big hits like “The Super Mario Galaxy Movie” and The “Ave Maria Project” is still going strongThere isn’t necessarily enough product to go around (the other big thing was “Lee Cronin’s The Mummy”), so theaters will be happy to book something like “Normal.”
But without a ready platform for a film like this to establish word of mouth, shooting the shot as far as possible in Weekend 1 doesn’t necessarily bode well for it sticking around in the long run.
IndieWire, however, understands that Magnolia is happy with the result and the distributor never saw “Normal” as a niche film. Odenkirk showed he could open an action movie with two “Nobody” movies, the last of which in 2025 grossed $43.2 million worldwide, so it would be short to trade “Normal” to release on far fewer screens than that franchise. In fact, the distributor had been aligned with Odenkirk and Kolstad since TIFF on how widely they wanted “Normal” to release, and the good news is that even with “Michael” opening next weekend, “Normal” hopes to maintain almost its entire screen count for Weekend 2.
It’s not too far from where we see most wider-release indies falling lately, and Magnolia’s 2024 “Thelma” is exactly the model Magnolia is looking at with “Normal.” Considering that the film was an unexpected hit and Magnolia’s biggest narrative film to dateIt would be a solid result. “Thelma” opened slightly below “Normal,” with around $2.3 million, but it also opened on more than 700 fewer screens and achieved a per-screen average of $1,785. Then it ultimately earned $9 million domestically and $13 million worldwide, and did so with above-average week-over-week retentions, even as it lost theaters.
“Thelma” was an original, fun, indie film that was a summer crowd-pleaser, and although Odenkirk is a few decades younger than June Squibb, both films fit the unconventional action mold that surely informed how Magnolia wanted to release “Normal.” All of this is part of a reinvention of itself towards a more commercial proposal that could be presented in the theater.
The difference is that “Normal” received a major marketing push that surpassed “Thelma,” as did the acquisition cost and, in fact, one of the largest P&A expenses for the distributor in history, IndieWire understands. Odenkirk toured the film as part of a tour to SXSW, his hometown of Chicago, and even real-life Normal, Illinois. The distributor also did a marketing campaign with QR codes that let you vote for “Bob for Sheriff,” and there’s even an upcoming USO show featuring the film later this week.
And unlike “Thelma,” “Normal” is also rated R, very violent property that premiered in Midnight Madness at TIFF and may not have the same mainstream appeal. The audience for “Normal” was mostly male and over 35, but the film did not overperform or underperform in any particular market domestically, suggesting it was not well positioned. Although “Nobody” is a viable composition, “Normal” is a darker and more serious film than that franchise and may not have had exactly the same scope.
Still to come, Magnolia has three more festival favorites: John Early’s “Maddie’s Secret,” Gregg Araki’s “I Want Your Sex,” and John Wilson’s “The History of Concrete.” All three are more genre-bending titles that, like “Normal,” Magnolia hopes to turn into commercial hits. For “I Want Your Sex,” the expectation is that it will potentially premiere on half as many screens as “Normal,” and it will do so alongside “Spider-Man: Brand New Day.”
Still, recreating the success of something like “Thelma”? It’s easier said than done.