Defying the dominant narrative about what works and what doesn’t at the box office these days, Everything Everywhere All at Once has become the first film distributed by the indie outfit A24 to pass the $100 million mark at the worldwide box office. Released in March, the film has made $68.9 million in the U.S. and another $31.1 million internationally.
Directed by Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert — collectively known as the Daniels — Everything Everywhere All at Once was produced on a reported budget of $25 million. A24 re-released the film this past weekend with eight minutes of extra footage, and despite being available on digital, it still brought in $650,000 from nearly 1,500 theaters.
By comparison, other top-performing A24 hits include Ari Aster’s horror film Hereditary ($79 million worldwide), Greta Gerwig’s Lady Bird ($78 million globally) and Barry Jenkins’ Moonlight ($65 million). The Safdie Brothers’ Uncut Gems was A24’s previous highest-grosser domestically, with $50 million. The top performing overseas markets for Everything Everywhere All at Once are the United Kingdom ($6.2 million), Canada ($5.1 million), Australia ($4.5 million), Russia ($2.4 million), Taiwan ($2.3 million), Mexico ($2 million), Hong Kong ($1.7 million), Germany ($1.5 million) and the Netherlands ($1.1 million).
It’s a true-blue sleeper hit at a time when most movies rely heavily on opening weekends for the majority of their earnings. The multiverse-hopping film arrived on the heels of Spider-Man: No Way Home, which was made on a ten-times bigger budget and concluded its international box office run with over $1.9 billion worldwide. Many drew comparison between the two movies, and praised Everything Everywhere All at Once for how emotionally resonant it remained despite its genre underpinnings.
Starring Michelle Yeoh in a role that is already attracting Oscar buzz, Everything Everywhere All at Once is a wild mashup of martial arts movies and the soaring romances of director Wong Kar-wai. It blends comic book storytelling with science-fiction and fantasy, but in its heart of hearts is a deeply affecting story about a mother and her daughter, and the generational divide that threatens to tear them apart.
The film has also been applauded for its representation of minority communities, for Son Lux’s score, and for re-introducing audiences to Ke Huy Quan, best known for playing Short Round in Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom nearly four decades ago. Collider’s own Ross Bonaime called it “one of the most ambitious and bonkers films in recent memory” in his rave review.
Co-produced by Joe and Anthony Russo, Everything Everywhere All at Once also stars Stephanie Hsu, James Hong, Jenny Slate and Jamie Lee Curtis. You can watch an interview with the Daniels here: