'Spider-Man: No Way Home' Silences 'Scream' To Retake Top Spot At Box Office

One week after losing the berth as the nation’s top grossing weekend box office hit to “Scream,” “Spider-Man: No Way Home” took back the leadership role as the most popular film among American moviegoers.

What Happened: “Spider-Man: No Way Home” brought in an additional $14.1 million to Sony Pictures SONY from 3,705 screens. The film, now in its sixth week of theatrical release, has grossed $721 million from the domestic box office and an additional $970.1 million from international markets.

“Scream” earned $12.4 million from 3,666 screens during its second week in theaters, a 59% decline from its premiere weekend engagement. To date, “Scream” has brought in $51.3 million in domestic ticket sales for ViacomCBS’ VIAC Paramount Pictures – and while that might seem modest compared to “Spider-Man: No Way Out,” it represented a rapid profit for the $24 million-budgeted production.

Comcast Corporation’s CMCSA Universal Pictures had the third and fourth most popular films with “Sing 2” and “Redeeming Love.” The animated “Sing 2” earned $5.7 million from 3,434 theaters for its fifth week in release. To date, the film’s domestic box office total has been $128.4 million.

“Redeeming Love,” an independently-produced faith-based feature that Universal distributed theatrically, debuted this weekend in 1,903 theaters and generated $3.7 million in ticket sales.

The Walt Disney Co. DIS saw its action-comedy “The King’s Man” ranked fifth with $1.7 million from 2,510 theaters. To date, the $100 million film only generated $31.5 million after five weeks in U.S. release, while taking in $65.1 million from international markets.

What Happens Next: No new films are in nationwide release this coming weekend, although several intriguing smaller films are being presented in limited release.

Showing up in theaters via MPI Media is Woody Allen’s “Rifkin’s Festival,” which was shot in 2019 and premiered in Spain in 2020, but is only now getting a U.S. release. Saban Films is offering the horror/thriller “The Requin” starring Alicia Silverstone and James Tupper as a couple stranded in a shark-heavy sea following a storm. Bleecker Street is bringing forth “Sundown” starring Tim Roth as a wealthy Briton attempting to abandon his family while vacationing in Acapulco.

Arriving in the U.S. from overseas via Kino Lorber is the domestic drama “Brighton 4th,” the Republic of Georgia’s entry in the Academy Award competition for Best International Feature Film, while Magnolia Pictures is importing the culinary-focused drama “A Taste of Hunger” from Denmark.

Also Happening: When the COVID-19 pandemic took root and families were encouraged to shelter at their home on Cape Cod, Paul and Jade Schuyler took advantage of their downtime at home to make a movie with their teen sons Quinn and Shaw.

The resulting work was the feature-length “Red River Road,” a horror/thriller about a family confined in their home by an unseen force. The four Schuylers did double duty as the stars of the film and the behind-the-camera crew, and their film opened on Friday for a one-week run at the Chatham Orpheum Theater in Massachusetts.

According to the Cape Cod Times, this is not the Schuylers’ first attempt at filmmaking – Paul and Jade’s short film “Runner” can be seen on Amazon’s AMZN Prime Video. “Red River Road” was a replacement project after a planned film called “Tuna Goddess” starring Jena Malone was cancelled when the pandemic began.

For Jade Schuyler, playing an on-screen matriarch was not a great stretch.

“When you're acting with your kids, it's very easy to be personal and know the pain of what it would be like to lose them,” she said. “I didn't really need the thought or the fear of COVID to kind of find that character. I think just being a mom is easy enough to gather that true emotional attachment.”

Photo: Zendaya and Tom Holland in "Spider-Man: No Way Home," via Sony Pictures.