Lokesh Kanagaraj’s Tamil film Leo: Damn Sweet, starring Vijay, debuted at number three at the global box office last weekend, raking in $31.2 million worldwide, according to Comscore estimates released on Sunday.
The weekend winner was Martin Scorsese’s Killers of the Flower Moon, starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Robert De Niro and Lily Gladstone, with $44 million, followed by Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour with $41.5 million. However, based on the worldwide cumulative total among new releases, Leo earned $48.5 million (over four days), compared to the $44 million earned by Killers of the Flower Moon.
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“Leo,” released Oct. 19, is an homage to David Cronenberg’s 2005 film “A History of Violence.” The action film is about a dutiful café owner (Vijay) who is encouraged to return to his violent past. The cast also includes Sanjay Dutt, Arjun Sarja, Trisha Krishnan, Madonna Sebastian, Gautham Vasudev Menon, Mysskin, Mansoor Ali Khan, George Marjan, Priya Anand and Matthew Thomas. The producers of the film are S.S. Lalit Kumar and Jagadish Palanisamy for Seven Screen.
In the US, Leo was released by Prathyangira Cinemas and earned $2.1 million over the weekend. In the UK and Ireland, it was released by Ahimsa Entertainment and grossed £1.07 million ($1.3 million) in its first three days of release.
Leo is the latest installation in Kanagaraj’s LCU or Lokesh’s cinematic universe, which began with Kaiti (2019), continued with Vikram in 2022 and retrospectively included the 1986 title Vikram. Characters from 2022’s Kaithi and Vikram appear in Leo.
This is the second time that Vijay, known as ‘Thalapathy’ (commander) to his fans, is teaming with Kanagaraj. They previously worked together on 2021’s The Master, which grossed $36 million. Vijay subsequently helmed Beast (2022) and Varisu (2023), both of which featured performances similar to Master.
Kanagaraj’s Vikram, starring Kamal Haasan, became one of the highest grossers in India in 2022 with a gross of $60 million. His next film will be South Indian film superstar Rajinikanth’s 171st film, which is yet to be titled.
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