'Project Hail Mary' Dominates Box Office With $141M Debut

A Record-Breaking Liftoff

Project Hail Mary, the sci-fi adventure starring Ryan Gosling, has blasted off with a staggering $141 million global opening weekend, claiming the title of 2026's biggest debut so far and setting a new record for Amazon MGM Studios.

The film earned $80.6 million domestically in North America and $60.4 million internationally across more than 80 markets, placing first in 60 of them. The result obliterated Amazon MGM's previous best opening — 2023's Creed III, which debuted at $58 million — and made it Gosling's second-largest launch after Barbie ($162 million).

From Bestseller to Blockbuster

Directed by Phil Lord and Christopher Miller — the duo behind The Lego Movie and Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse — the film is based on Andy Weir's 2021 novel of the same name. Weir, who also wrote The Martian, reportedly sent his manuscript to Gosling before the book was even published, asking him to produce the adaptation. Gosling agreed and immediately brought Lord and Miller aboard.

The screenplay was written by Drew Goddard, who previously adapted The Martian for Ridley Scott — a script that earned him an Oscar nomination. The filmmakers waited until Goddard was available before beginning production, a decision that appears to have paid off handsomely. The film also stars Sandra Hüller, with Greig Fraser serving as cinematographer.

With a reported production budget of around $200 million (approximately $248 million before tax credits, according to Puck), the film represented a significant bet by Amazon MGM — one that the opening weekend has emphatically validated.

Critical and Audience Acclaim

The commercial success has been matched by near-universal praise. Project Hail Mary holds a 95% Certified Fresh score on Rotten Tomatoes from nearly 300 reviews, alongside a 96% audience score from over 5,000 verified ratings. CinemaScore audiences awarded it an "A" grade, while Metacritic assigned it a 77 out of 100.

"A visually dazzling space odyssey that's carried along effortlessly by the gravitational pull of Ryan Gosling at his most winning, Project Hail Mary is a near-miraculous fusion of smarts and heart." — Rotten Tomatoes Critics Consensus

The film follows Ryland Grace, a man who wakes aboard an interstellar spacecraft with no memory of how he got there, and must use science to save humanity from extinction. Critics have praised Gosling's performance as one of his most appealing, with several already positioning the film as a major Oscar contender.

A Win for Original Storytelling

Perhaps most notably, Project Hail Mary scored the second-largest opening for a non-franchise film in history, behind only Christopher Nolan's Oppenheimer, which debuted at $82.4 million in 2023. It also surpassed Jordan Peele's Us ($71 million) as the biggest March opening for an original property.

The result adds to a growing trend of audiences rewarding ambitious, non-sequel storytelling — a pattern that has given Hollywood studios renewed confidence in greenlighting original intellectual properties. For Amazon MGM, which has faced questions about its theatrical strategy since acquiring the studio, the film represents a definitive statement of intent.

With strong word-of-mouth, stellar audience scores, and virtually no major competition on the horizon, Project Hail Mary appears poised for a lengthy and lucrative theatrical run well beyond its spectacular opening weekend.