Poppy Stockell’s John Farnham: Finding the Voice is already on a path to becoming one of the highest grossing Australian documentaries of all time.
Sony took big swing with the film, releasing it on 287 screens over the weekend after a strong Mother’s Day preview campaign.
An authorised doc, Finding the Voice canvasses John Farnham’s life from the days of Sadie the Cleaning Lady in the ’60s, his career highs and lows in its wake, through to his record-breaking success with single You’re the Voice and 1986 album Whispering Jack – still the highest selling Australian album of all time.
The doc bowed over the weekend to $818,888, landing at no. 3 behind Fast X and Guardians of the Galaxy: Vol 3. With previews, it finished at $1.13 million by Sunday’s end.
Sony announced the film will pass $1.15 million today, meaning it will overtake the lifetime result of Mystify: Michael Hutchence ($1.14 million) to become the 10th biggest local documentary of all time. It will also easily head past Mrs. Carey’s Concert ($1.16 million), Embrace ($1.18 million) and Sherpa ($1.2 million) in the coming days.
Finding the Voice‘s success comes after a difficult period for local feature documentaries at the box office. In 2022, no Australian documentary made over $350,000 theatrically and only nine made over $100,000.
At the Australian International Documentary conference earlier this year, Madman Entertainment CEO Paul Wiegard reflected 2022 had been “terrible” for feature docs, noting the stark commercial reality that a distributor struggles to make revenue on a film that makes below $500,000. With Finding the Voice, only seven Australian documentaries have made over that number since 2018 (though Madman’s Giants is getting close to that mark).
Stephen Basil-Jones, Sony Pictures EVP ANZ, tells IF he is incredibly proud to have been involved with the film; he knew from rough cut that they were on to something special. Farnham is part of the Sony family, so it as been a passion project for the Sony team, but also a “great marriage” with producers Beyond Entertainment.
“The film is, as far as I’m concerned, one of the best documentaries I’ve seen, and it just happens to be Australian,” Basil-Jones says.
In terms of release strategy, Sony was always aware that Farnham could reach a wide audience, having been a household name in Australia for decades.
“There’s been a generation after generation that’s known something about John Farnham. We knew that his popularity was not just big city, but it was regional, country and everywhere. So we had a film that was genuinely appealing to not only all ages in some respects, but in all demographics and in all areas of Australia,” Basil-Jones says.
“We said, ‘Well, look, let’s take it wide.’ He’s probably played in every single little RSL, pub and workers club in all these towns. Let’s get him on to the single cinema screen in [those towns].”
Village Cinemas national programming manager Geoff Chard notes the film doubled the opening weekend of 2018’s Jimmy Barnes doc Working Class Boy which opened to $440k and went on to take $820k lifetime, and is far ahead of last year’s Lee Kernaghan: Boy From The Bush which took $270k lifetime.
“It goes to show there is significant interest from the general public in these iconic Australia artists; hopefully the results will spur production of more of these documentaries in the future,” he tells IF.
Cinema Nova CEO Kristian Connelly echoes the sentiment, reflecting the film is playing best at ‘mainstream’ suburban locations, “showing that as with past local hits including The Dry, Lion, Ride Like A Girl and Rams, the office potential appeal of accessible, broad-appeal releases is relatively untapped.”
“Given that word of mouth for Finding the Voice is likely to be strong and older audiences are traditionally slower to catch-on to local titles that appeal, the film should leg-out to a result of $3 million or more,” he predicts.
The Hayden Orpheum Picture Palace in Sydney was the no. 1 independent site for the film.
“Great to see such a fantastic documentary break out and become such a crowd-pleasing commercial success which is a true testament to how Sony have handled the film, including releasing the film at the perfect time,” says GM Alex Temesvari.
Wallis Cinemas programming manager David Simpson described the film as “a sensation”.
“The journey is connecting with audiences,” he says.
Majestic Cinemas CEO Kieren Dell calls it “an absolute upside surprise”, noting it was always going to be popular with regional audiences but found it was “doing well from the very first session and especially during the weekdays, which is great counter programming.”
“A great result and a credit to Sony for supporting it,” he tells IF.
While initially intended for a limited season, Basil-Jones hints the film may still stick around for a while: “It is a limited season, but like a John Farnham concert tour, they are sometimes extended by popular demand. And I’m just going to leave it at that.”
The 10th instalment in the Fast & Furious franchise, Fast X, was the weekend’s no. 1 title, opening to $6.8 million from 687 screens for Universal. While a solid result, it is a decline on the opening weekend of the last couple of films in the franchise, with Fate of the Furious starting at $10.1 million and F9 at $8.9 million.
Directed by Louis Leterrier, Fast X sees Vin Diesel return as Dom Toretto as his crew go up against the most lethal opponent they’ve faced.
Its $US67.5 million debut Stateside was considered soft but in line with projections, and close to F9‘s $US70 million. However, Fast X is still finding strong audiences internationally with a $US319 million worldwide result, making it the second best opening globally of 2023 after The Super Mario Bros. Movie.
The film has a reported production budget of $US340 million, the highest in the franchise so far.
Finding the Voice wasn’t the only Australian release to hit cinemas last weekend, with Ivan Sen’s Limbo, which first premiered in competition at Berlinale, opening at no. 15. Bonsai Films/Dark Matter Distribution opened the film on 40 screens, earning $50,095, or $76,219 with previews.
It was the top new release at Cinema Nova last weekend. “It’s a solid opening for the noir drama, leveraging off Sen’s prior hit Mystery Road as well as in-cinema support from star Simon Baker. With minor competition from new releases this Thursday, the film should enjoy strong word of mouth,” Connelly says.
Overall Numero puts the top 20 titles at $16.3 million, up 22 per cent on the previous weekend.
Dell describes the weekend as the first in some time to see a layering effect of multiple movies for multiple audiences.
“Fast X was very solid with decent crowds, although you can feel the franchise softening a little. Hopefully it has decent legs. Guardians of the Galaxy has held up well again, as did Book Club for our older patrons,” he says.
While appealing to a similar demographic to Fast X, Disney/Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy: Vol 3 only dropped 49 per cent to take $3.5 million in its third frame, advancing to $24.4 million.
Universal’s Book Club 2: The Next Chapter dropped 41 per cent in its second weekend to $676,891, moving to $2.4 million. Stablemate The Super Mario Bros. Movie is now at $50.37 million after a seventh weekend result of $672,239, meaning it is just a hair away from surpassing Shrek 2 ($50.39 million) to become the highest grossing animation ever released in Australia (if you don’t count 2019’s “live-action” The Lion King as animation, that is).
Sony rom-com Love Again made $204,222 in its second frame to move to $913,374, while John Wick: Chapter 4 has reached $24.7 million for Studiocanal after earning $132,646 in its ninth. John Wick is now a $US1 billion franchise at the worldwide box office across all four films.
Evil Dead Rise has reached $3.5 million for Warner Bros after five weekends, having pocketed an extra $103,251.
Forum Distribution’s controversial Hindi-language ISIS drama The Kerala Story dropped 57 per cent in its second weekend, gathering $101,105 to move to $404,659.
Rounding out the top 10 was WB’s Air, still playing in cinemas after seven weekends despite now being on Amazon Prime Video. It tallied $84,434 to bring its overall result to $9 million.
Of Australian holdovers, Madman documentary Giants remains in the top 20, taking $25,831 to move to $455,403.
Kismet’s Shackleton: The Greatest Story of Survival is still in the top 40 after 11 weekends, tallying $322,032 overall.
This weekend is all about Disney’s The Little Mermaid for most exhibitors. Village’s Chard says he is hopeful for a similar result to Aladdin in 2019.