This week’s Weekend POURcast covers the second weekend November, 2026
Welcome to the Weekend POURcast, your boozy guide to the box office.
Every Friday, we serve up what’s new in theaters and on streaming, movies only, paired with a curated cocktail suggestion to match the weekend.
November officially belongs to the holidays now. We have Johnny Depp playing Ebenezer Scrooge, Nicholas Hoult livestreaming bank robberies, Maika Monroe going full Victorian nightmare, Godzilla trying to hold onto IMAX screens, and The Cat in the Hat trying to convince families it still has another weekend in those striped socks. In other words, we have reached that delightful part of the year where Christmas movies, prestige dramas, action movies, horror, and giant monsters are all fighting for the same parking lot.
Last Weekend in Review
Godzilla Minus Zero delivered exactly the kind of opening we thought it might, taking No. 1 with just over $30.5 million and setting a new domestic opening record for a live-action non-English-language film, excluding The Passion of the Christ. That is a remarkable result for a Japanese-language sequel built around postwar trauma, human drama, and one extremely irritated radioactive reptile.
The Cat in the Hat finished second with $20 million. That is not disastrous, but considering the size of the brand and Warner Bros.’ hopes for a new animated franchise, it landed closer to “fine” than “event.” Drummer Boy continued Angel Studios’ knack for finding underserved audiences with a strong $9.4 million opening, while Ramayana: Rise of a Legend brought in $8.9 million from only 1,433 theaters. You Can See Everything rounded out the Top 5 with another $8.4 million, bringing its remarkable documentary run close to $80 million domestic.
The whole market rebounded sharply after Halloween weekend, with total domestic business nearly doubling. More importantly, last weekend once again showed that moviegoers are perfectly willing to embrace something different when the hook is strong enough. A Japanese-language Godzilla drama won the weekend, a Hindi-language epic landed in the Top 5, a Revolutionary War musical finished third, and a three-hour Elizabeth Holmes documentary kept hanging around. That is a healthy chart.
Now Johnny Depp gets to see whether Scrooge can steal Godzilla’s crown.
New in Theaters This Weekend
Ebenezer
Johnny Depp returns to major studio filmmaking as Ebenezer Scrooge in Paramount’s new reimagining of A Christmas Carol, directed by Ti West. That last part may be the most interesting thing here because West built his reputation on horror with X, Pearl, and MaXXXine, and Ebenezer appears to lean much harder into the ghost-story side of Charles Dickens than the warm-and-fuzzy Christmas side.
Paramount is selling this as a gothic supernatural fantasy rather than another cheerful holiday retelling, which may help distinguish it from the approximately nine thousand other versions of this story. Ian McKellen, Rupert Grint, Andrea Riseborough, Daisy Ridley, Sam Claflin, Tramell Tillman, and Ellie Bamber round out the cast.
Current tracking puts the opening between $20 million and $25 million, which should be enough to make it the favorite for No. 1. But the bigger question is whether audiences want Johnny Depp back in the center of a major studio release. That makes Ebenezer more than just a test of Scrooge. It is a test of Depp.
How to Rob a Bank
David Leitch returns with another slick action movie, this time built around a gang of social-media-savvy bank robbers who broadcast their crimes online. Nicholas Hoult, Zoë Kravitz, Anna Sawai, Rhenzy Feliz, Christian Slater, Pete Davidson, and John C. Reilly lead the cast, which is enough names to make the movie sound like somebody robbed several other productions on the way to the casting office.
The hook is modern and easy to understand: a crew turns bank robbery into content, their audience grows, and suddenly the fame becomes just as dangerous as the FBI agents hunting them. That feels like exactly the kind of premise that could either work beautifully or age horribly in six months.
Early reviews suggest the movie is fast, entertaining, and very much in Leitch’s wheelhouse, even if nobody is calling it profound. Sometimes that is fine. Movies are allowed to be fun. Tracking has cooled considerably, with most projections now somewhere between $6 million and $12 million, but there is still upside here if younger audiences respond to the energy and cast.
Victorian Psycho
Maika Monroe stars as a governess hired to care for children at an isolated Victorian estate, which is traditionally how approximately 73% of terrible things begin. Jason Isaacs, Thomasin McKenzie, and Ruth Wilson co-star in the Bleecker Street horror-thriller, which puts Monroe back into the kind of uncomfortable psychological territory she handles extremely well.
The commercial expectations are modest, somewhere around $3 million to $5 million, but this feels like exactly the sort of movie that could find a longer life after opening weekend if word of mouth is strong. The title certainly understands the assignment.
Ghost Soldier
Sony opened Ghost Soldier on Wednesday, which makes it technically a midweek release but absolutely part of this weekend’s box office picture. The military-action thriller is expected to bring in somewhere around $4 million to $8 million over its first five days, which puts it in the mix with the lower half of the Top 10.
That may not sound enormous, but this is the kind of movie that can play steadily if the action crowd responds. There are worse strategies than opening two days early while everybody else is waiting for Friday.
Also Arriving in Theaters
Neon opens Paper Tiger in limited release this weekend, with Adam Driver, Scarlett Johansson, and Miles Teller leading James Gray’s crime drama about two brothers getting pulled into increasingly dangerous dealings with Russians in 1980s Queens. That cast alone makes it one of the weekend’s most intriguing prestige titles.
Sony Pictures Classics also brings Bitter Christmas into limited release, while Hurricanna, Orfeo, Dead of Night, God with Us, and Search Party: Where’s PawPaw? fill out the specialty slate. And because nostalgia never sleeps, The Angry Birds Movie is back in theaters for its 10th anniversary. Apparently we are old enough for that now.
Box Office Forecast: November 13th-15th, 2026
1. Ebenezer
$21M to $26M
The current tracking looks about right. The Depp factor creates curiosity, the Christmas season is beginning, and the gothic approach gives the movie a darker identity than most holiday fare. The real question is whether curiosity turns into enthusiasm.
2. Godzilla Minus Zero
$13M to $17M
The first weekend was excellent, audience scores are strong, and premium screens should help. A drop under 50% would be another major win and further proof that this is not just a front-loaded event.
3. The Cat in the Hat
$9M to $13M
Family word of mouth is better than the reviews, which should keep this alive. It may not be the blockbuster Warner Bros. hoped for, but families need options, and the Thanksgiving corridor is still two weeks away.
4. How to Rob a Bank
$7M to $11M
I am slightly more optimistic than the lowest tracking. The cast is strong, the premise is easy to sell, and there is not much direct action competition this weekend. If audiences decide they want something fast and dumb in the best possible way, this could push into double digits.
5. Drummer Boy
$5M to $7M
The opening proved Angel Studios once again knows how to reach its audience. A decent hold keeps it inside the Top 5 conversation, especially as Christmas approaches.
The Johnny Depp Question
There is no way around it: Ebenezer is also a Johnny Depp referendum. Depp has not led a major Hollywood studio release in years, and his return carries more baggage than the average holiday movie campaign. Paramount is clearly betting that enough of the audience either misses him, is curious about him, or simply wants to see what Ti West does with A Christmas Carol.
That makes this weekend unusually interesting. If Ebenezer opens above $25 million and holds well through Thanksgiving, the industry will read that as evidence that Depp remains commercially viable in mainstream studio filmmaking. If it opens soft, the conversation changes immediately. That is a lot of pressure to put on Tiny Tim.
Horror After Halloween
Halloween may be over, but horror has apparently decided it does not recognize calendars. Victorian Psycho arrives this weekend, while Clayface remains in theaters and several October genre releases are still hanging around. More importantly, Ebenezer itself is leaning into gothic ghosts, supernatural terror, and the darker bones of Dickens’ story.
That feels appropriate. A Christmas Carol is, after all, a ghost story about a terrified old man being psychologically dismantled by supernatural entities until he stops being awful. We just put holly around it.
New Movies on Streaming This Weekend
The streaming slate is smaller than the theatrical side, but there are several genuinely worthwhile movie premieres.
Being Heumann | Apple TV
Directed by Siân Heder, who won the Academy Award for CODA, Being Heumann tells the story of disability-rights activist Judy Heumann and the historic 1977 occupation of a federal building in San Francisco. Ruth Madeley stars as Heumann, with Mark Ruffalo, Dylan O’Brien, and Roberta Colindrez in supporting roles.
The movie has been building strong festival buzz since Toronto and AFI, and the story itself is remarkable. When government officials refused to listen, hundreds of disabled activists simply occupied their building and refused to leave. Sometimes democracy needs a little trespassing.
Heartland | Netflix
Jessica Chastain heads to Nashville in Heartland, a new mystery-thriller from writer-director Shana Feste. Chastain plays Misty Jones, a former country superstar who comes out of seclusion after her rising-star niece disappears. Her search pulls her into Nashville’s darker corners and forces her to confront parts of her own past she would rather leave buried.
Garrett Hedlund, Ross Lynch, Jennifer Nettles, John Hawkes, Paul Sparks, and Carter Faith round out the cast. Country music, family secrets, murder, and Jessica Chastain looking suspicious of everyone around her feels very much like Netflix understanding what Friday night looks like.
The End of Oak Street | HBO Max
After its theatrical run and PVOD release, The End of Oak Street arrives on HBO Max Friday. Anne Hathaway stars in the sci-fi survival film about an ordinary suburban neighborhood suddenly ripped out of the world and deposited somewhere considerably less friendly.
Ewan McGregor, Maisy Stella, Christian Convery, and Emily Kuroda also star. The film underperformed theatrically but reportedly performed much better on digital, which makes HBO Max the natural place for the audience that looked at the trailers and thought, “I will absolutely watch that when it comes home.”
That audience has arrived.
PAW Patrol: The Dino Movie | Paramount+
Families get PAW Patrol: The Dino Movie, which hit Paramount+ Thursday and is therefore officially part of the weekend couch lineup. Dogs, dinosaurs, and children. No further market research was required.
Weekend Drink Pairing: Red Herring Getaway Cocktail
This weekend’s pairing is the Red Herring Getaway Cocktail, and we finally have the perfect weekend for it.
How to Rob a Bank is built around criminals, misdirection, social-media spectacle, and an increasingly desperate attempt to stay one move ahead of law enforcement. Heartland is built around secrets and people who may not be telling the truth. Victorian Psycho involves a governess entering a house where absolutely nothing good is going to come from trusting anyone.
Even Ebenezer is basically one long night of Scrooge being misdirected through time by people who refuse to tell him where he is going next. The Red Herring Getaway Cocktail fits, and it already lives on CocktailsandMovies.com, which means you can click through, mix one properly, and spend the weekend pretending your biggest problem is whether the police have your license plate.
Final Pour
This is a transition weekend. Halloween is behind us, Thanksgiving is two weeks away, Christmas movies are officially arriving, and awards contenders are beginning to creep into theaters.
Ebenezer gets the spotlight, but the weekend underneath it is much more interesting than it first appears. Godzilla Minus Zero gets to prove whether its record-setting opening had real legs. How to Rob a Bank tries to turn social-media chaos into an action hit. Victorian Psycho keeps horror alive, while Being Heumann and Heartland give streaming audiences two very different reasons to stay home.
Next weekend brings The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping, so enjoy the relative calm. The holidays are about to get loud. 🍸🍿
