Other Mommy opens at No. 1 with a D+ CinemaScore and an 18% Rotten Tomatoes score
Jessica Chastain's horror film made $27.5 million in North America and $45.1 million worldwide on a $19 million budget, despite a D+ from the audiences who saw it.
Other Mommy opened at No. 1 in North America with $27.5 million, and almost every measure of what audiences thought of it came back bad. It earned a D+ CinemaScore. It sat at 18% with Rotten Tomatoes critics and 46% with audiences as of Saturday. Universal had held reviews back until release.
None of it slowed the opening. Deadline called the global result of $45.1 million "quite commendable" for a horror film that cost $19 million.
The weekend, day by day
- Friday: $12.6 million.
- Saturday: $8.95 million.
- Sunday: $5.95 million.
- Total: $27.5 million from 3,365 theaters.
Saturday fell 29% from Friday, and Sunday fell another 33.5%. On Saturday, Deadline had the film eyeing a $28 million weekend; the Sunday update put it at $27.5 million. A strong campaign drove people to the first showings. The scores they gave on the way out are the ones Deadline says could hurt its longevity.
The exit polls
- CinemaScore: D+.
- PostTrak: 47% in the top two boxes and 33% definite recommend, which Deadline called "not great".
- Rotten Tomatoes: 18% from critics and 46% from audiences.
- Audience: 51% male, 49% female. The largest group, 38%, was 18 to 24.
- Where it played best: the West, South and South Central US. AMC Burbank was the top cinema.
Rob Savage directs, with James Wan producing alongside Blumhouse Atomic Monster. Jessica Chastain stars in two roles: the real mother and the creature that copies her.
What the film is
Other Mommy is based on Incidents Around the House, a 2024 novel by Josh Malerman, adapted by screenwriter Nathan Elston. Seven-year-old Bela (Arabella Olivia Clark) is struggling with a new school and with the growing distance between her parents: Ursula (Chastain), consumed by her corporate career, and Russ (Jay Duplass), an unemployed househusband. She starts seeing an entity that looks like her mother. Bela calls it Other Mommy, and it keeps asking to be let into her heart.
- Also starring: Dichen Lachman, Arian Moayed and Karen Allen.
- Shot in: Dublin, Ireland, from May to July 2025.
- Running time: 93 minutes.
- Box office, per Wikipedia: $44.2 million, almost $1 million below the global figure Deadline reported.
How it compares
Deadline offered Universal's own horror openings as comps:
- The Black Phone: $23.6 million.
- The Black Phone 2: $27.3 million.
- The Exorcist: Believer: $26.5 million.
- Other Mommy: $27.5 million.
It beat all three, Black Phone 2 by $200,000, and did it with a D+ CinemaScore.
Chastain's sixth-biggest opening
Deadline ranks it as Jessica Chastain's sixth-highest opening in North America, after It Chapter Two ($91 million), The Martian ($54.3 million), Interstellar ($47.5 million), X-Men: Dark Phoenix ($32.8 million) and Mama ($28.4 million). Most of those were ensembles. Counting only films she leads alone, Other Mommy is second, behind Mama, another horror film, by $900,000.
Around the world
The $45.1 million global start came from 51 territories, with $17.6 million outside North America. Deadline said it played especially well in Catholic countries, particularly Latin America, because of the nature of the film.
- UK and Ireland: $2.6 million at 625 screens, passing the lifetime gross of The Boogeyman to become Savage's highest-grossing theatrical release there.
- Italy: $2.2 million at 315 screens, 31% of the weekend market.
- Mexico: $1.9 million, 24% of the market.
- Australia: $1.1 million at 246 screens, No. 2 with a 14% share.
- Spain: nearly $1 million, No. 2 behind a local hit.
- Brazil: $800,000 at 726 screens, No. 3.
- Middle East: $1.7 million, including No. 1 in the UAE with $700,000 and $600,000 in Saudi Arabia.
- Southeast Asia: $2.2 million, led by Indonesia, Taiwan and Malaysia.
The overall domestic market came to $85.2 million for the weekend, up 18.5% on the same weekend last year, despite a hurricane that distributors said hurt business in the Gulf region.
What is still unknown
- The second weekend. Deadline warned the scores could affect the film's longevity. The next frame will show how much.
- Whether the Rotten Tomatoes score moves now that reviews are fully in.
- Where it finishes against its $19 million cost, before marketing.
Other Mommy cost $19 million and made $45.1 million around the world in three days. The people who paid to see it gave it a D+.