Poor Things, a multi-golden globe winning film by the Greek director Yorgos Lanthimos, dominated the Greek box office and beyond upon its release.
Lanthimos’s film celebrating female equality and liberation sold more than 200,000 tickets within 15 days of its release, according to Greek audiovisual company Feelgood.
The movie won the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival, along with two Golden Globes and a Critic’s Choice Movie Award, and continues to pull in large crowds with the majority of screenings sold out even on weekdays.
According to Feelgood, cinema goers admit to watching Lanthimo’s poor Things – which stars Emma Stone as Bella Baxter – more than once. Earlier today (Monday, January 15), Stone took home the Critic’s Choice Best Actress Award for her role, while the film was nominated for 13 categories, including best picture.
IMDB’s Box Office Mojo shows that the film has grossed $17,723,307 in the US in the five weeks it has been on show, while raking in almost $2,000,000 to date in theaters worldwide.
Poor Things also had the highest per-theater average of any movie in the top 10 in the US ($15,548). Showing in just nine theaters in its opening week, it grossed $661k with a per-theater average of $73,470, according to Slashfilm.com.
It opened in the UK on January 12.
Lanthimos’s Poor Thing’s Success At The Golden Globes
The film won the awards for Best Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy, and Best Actress at the Golden Globes earlier this month, after which Lanthimos gave a shoutout to Bruce Springsteen, who was in the audience.
The director said: “I just wanted to speak to Bruce Springsteen. We have the same birthday. He’s been my hero since I grew up.”
Lanthimos thanked Springsteen for “making me grow up the way that I did” while accepting the award for Poor Things. Stone also received a nod from Lanthimos. “She won. You know it. She’s the best,” he said.
Poor Things sees Stone playing a young woman, Bella Baxter, who goes on a journey of self-discovery and sexual awakening as she travels around the world.
“Bella falls in love with life itself, rather than a person, [and] she accepts the good and bad in equal measure,” Stone said in her acceptance speech. “And that really made me look at life differently, and that all of it counts. She has stayed with me deeply, so this means the world to me.”
She thanked director Yorgos Lanthimos, saying she would “forever be grateful that we met” and writer Tony McNamara, jokingly said: “I love getting to say this dialogue, and I love getting to horrify you with my Australian accent.”
Lanthimos, born in Athens in 1973, has received several accolades, including a BAFTA Film Award, three nominations for Academy Awards, and three nominations for Golden Globe Awards.
The Globes marks the first major ceremony of film awards season, which culminates with the Oscars on March 10th.