Netflix Posts La Bola Negra Grosses and a New Scoreboard

La Bola Negra took in $277,500 from four U.S. theaters, and Netflix posted the figure itself. The per-screen take was $69,375, second among films not in English only to Parasite. It is the first time the company has officially reported a box office gross.

The average is a four-room trophy. Box Office Mojo already carries Spain’s $26,477,867 theatrical total for the same movie, and Netflix now has to keep publishing numbers on much wider titles after cutting 1,000 jobs.

Four Theaters Posted a $69,375 Average

Netflix opened the Spanish-language epic on Oct. 16 at the Paris Theater and the Angelika in New York and at AMC Century City and AMC Burbank in Los Angeles. Friday brought $108,300. Saturday brought $84,600. The three-day total, issued by the company on Sunday, was $277,500.

Netflix said that is the highest per-screen average ever for a Spanish-language film, and the second highest for any film not in English. Parasite, in 2019, opened to $393,216 from three theaters, or $131,072 a screen. Neon’s Fjord, another awards title, had opened the weekend before to $124,000 from four theaters, or $31,000 a screen.

OPENING WEEKEND PER-SCREEN AVERAGES

Four hand-picked art houses in New York and Los Angeles will almost always print a fat average. The live test is whether that hold as the map grows, not whether the Paris Theater can fill a Friday in October.

Netflix said the film set house records for a movie not in English, excluding dubbed anime, at the Angelika, the Paris Theater, and AMC Century City. The Paris posting was the theater’s second-highest opening weekend of any kind. Netflix holds a 10-year lease on that room. Spencer Klein, the company’s global theatrical distribution head, is the executive now putting these figures on the record.

The Same Film Has $26,477,867 in Spain

Javier Calvo and Javier Ambrossi, the Spanish pair known as Los Javis, premiered La Bola Negra at Cannes, where it drew a 16-minute standing ovation and tied for the best director prize with Paweł Pawlikowski’s Fatherland. Netflix bought U.S. rights there for about $5 million and later added Canada. Spain was never Netflix’s release.

The movie opened in Spain on Sept. 25 to $5,417,555. After four weekends it has $26,477,867 there, against a U.S. figure that is still the opening weekend. International stands at $26,562,116. The worldwide total is $26,839,616, of which the new American number is 1 percent.

U.S. DEBUT VS. THE SPANISH RUN

The U.S. disclosure is a qualifying-run press release for a film that already sold tickets in its home market at a scale four New York and Los Angeles screens cannot match. Box Office Mojo is counting a commercial life Netflix did not have to invent. What the company did invent is a public American scoreboard, starting with the smallest, cleanest number it could post.

The film is an R-rated, 2 hour 40 minute queer epic drawn from an unfinished play by Federico García Lorca. It follows three gay men across linked lives and is Spain’s entry in the international feature race. It also won the Toronto International Film Festival People’s Choice Award and picked up audience prizes in San Sebastian and Busan. Glenn Close and Penélope Cruz are in the ensemble, with Guitarricadelafuente, Milo Quifes, and Carlos González.

When we began writing La Bola Negra, we wanted to tell a story about freedom, legacy, and the importance of LGBTQ+ visibility. Above all, we wanted to honor the generations of people whose courage and sacrifice made our freedoms possible today.

Javier Calvo and Javier Ambrossi, joint statement

Who Bought Tickets at the Paris and the Angelika?

Netflix paid for a traditional campaign, with billboards that were hard to miss in Los Angeles, standees, trailers, and community screenings. A poetry salon hosted by John Cameron Mitchell, modeled on Lorca’s secret 1930s gatherings, ran ahead of the New York premiere at NewFest. Guitarricadelafuente’s single from the film, La Nieve, landed on Sept. 18. Pau Brunet, a box-office analyst, said Netflix had already organized more than 200 screenings in Los Angeles before the paid weekend.

Exit surveys supplied by Netflix were loud. Some 96% rated the film Excellent or Very Good, with 80% choosing Excellent, and 87% gave it a Definite Recommend. Critics have it at 87% on Rotten Tomatoes. The crowd skewed male, at 66%, and young: 51% were under 35, and ages 25 to 34 were the largest group at 39%.

That age mix is the part of the weekend that travels. A Netflix prestige title that actually draws people under 35 is harder to file as an Academy homework assignment. It still does not tell you what happens when the movie leaves four deluxe rooms.

THE FOUR OPENING VENUES

• Paris Theater, New York: Netflix’s leased house, with the film’s second-highest opening weekend of any title there.
• Angelika, New York: House record for a film not in English, excluding dubbed anime, per Netflix.
• AMC Century City, Los Angeles: The same non-English house record, excluding dubbed anime.
• AMC Burbank, Los Angeles: The fourth screen in the opening set, across the basin from Century City.

The official film account spent the Monday after opening pushing those houses and pointing readers to official listings for La Bola Negra tickets.

Opening weekend audiences are loving LA BOLA NEGRA. In theaters now. Get tickets at https://t.co/N8mFQX3BP7. pic.twitter.com/b8mAddMpun

— La Bola Negra Film (@LaBolaNegraFilm) October 19, 2026

Peter Rice Inherits a Weekly Public Scoreboard

The gross arrived after a brutal week inside the company. On Oct. 14, co-CEOs Ted Sarandos and Greg Peters told staff they were cutting about 6% of the workforce, or 1,000 jobs, with the heaviest hits in product, tech, legal, and HR. The next day Netflix named Peter Rice chief content officer, effective Oct. 26, and said Bela Bajaria was leaving after nearly 10 years. Film chief Dan Lin also lost his job.

Rice most recently chaired Walt Disney Television and oversaw a stack of broadcast, cable, and studio brands. He is a theatrical-world operator walking into a company that, until this weekend, treated multiplexes as a marketing stunt. Sarandos has called movie theaters an “outmoded idea.” The new reporting policy is the opposite bet: ticket sales as a number no one can massage the way a streaming hour can be massaged.

Peter is one of the most effective at-scale operators in the entertainment industry. His business acumen is sharp, his talent relationships are exceptionally strong, and his experience across TV and film is deep and broad.

Ted Sarandos, co-CEO, Netflix newsroom statement

The stock has fallen more than 40% over the past year, after a failed run at Warner Bros. Discovery. Netflix reports third-quarter results on Oct. 20. Jeff Bock of Exhibitor Relations called the disclosure “one small step for Netflix” and “one giant leap for theatrical.” Wall Street may read the same figures as another weekly grade for Sarandos, which is how Apple learned to feel about opening weekends.

Fincher, Gerwig, and the Titles That Cannot Hide

A $69,375 average on four screens is a specialty story. The policy Netflix just switched on is not. The company says it will keep disclosing grosses for the wider movies behind this one, including David Fincher’s The Further Mis-Adventures of Cliff Booth around Thanksgiving and Greta Gerwig’s Narnia: The Magician’s Nephew on Feb. 12, 2027. Narnia is due a 49-day run before it hits the service on April 2, the first Netflix title planned as a conventional theatrical rollout.

THE TITLES NOW ON THE PUBLIC LEDGER

• La Bola Negra: Theaters Oct. 16, streaming Dec. 2, a 47-day exclusive window.
• The Further Mis-Adventures of Cliff Booth: David Fincher, around Thanksgiving, with IMAX in the plan.
• Narnia: The Magician’s Nephew: Greta Gerwig, Feb. 12, 2027, 49 days in theaters, streaming April 2.
• Charlie vs. the Chocolate Factory: Taika Waititi’s animated feature, dated to 2027.
• The Mosquito Bowl and Ink: Peter Berg and Danny Boyle, both listed for significant windows.

Apple already ran this experiment in public. Apple theatrical grosses including F1 show how fast the mood flips: F1 reached $633,242,436 worldwide, while Argylle finished at $96,226,228 and Fly Me to the Moon at $38,198,351. Reporting is fun when the movie has the goods. It is a problem when it does not. Netflix has now volunteered for that weather on films that will not open in four rooms.

The previous longest Netflix window was 30 days, on Noah Baumbach’s Marriage Story in 2019. Roma and other awards titles got even less. La Bola Negra’s 47-day exclusive run, from Oct. 16 to a Dec. 2 streaming date in the United States and Canada, is the company’s longest. Exhibitors wanted that. They also wanted the grosses. They now have both, which means the Fincher and Gerwig weekends will be read like studio weekends.

The Film Adds Cities While the Books Stay Open

The U.S. map grows on a fixed calendar. San Francisco, Toronto, Brooklyn, and Landmark Sunset in Los Angeles join on Oct. 24. Thirteen more markets, plus extra runs in New York and Los Angeles, arrive on Oct. 30. A wider break is set for Nov. 6, with locations still to be confirmed. Then the film leaves theaters for the service on Dec. 2.

THE U.S. THEATRICAL CALENDAR

1. October 16, 2026: Opens in four theaters in New York and Los Angeles to $277,500.
2. October 24, 2026: Adds San Francisco, Toronto, Brooklyn, and Landmark Sunset in Los Angeles.
3. October 30, 2026: Adds 13 more markets and extra runs in New York and Los Angeles.
4. November 6, 2026: Wider expansion, sites still unconfirmed.
5. December 2, 2026: Arrives on Netflix in the United States and Canada.

Rice starts on Oct. 26, four days after the earnings report, with those extra cities already in play and the grosses still public. Awards voters can still put the film in front of The Odyssey. The new fact is smaller and harder to walk back: Netflix will keep saying the number out loud, on this title and on the ones that follow, whether the average looks like Parasite or like a problem.

Disclaimer: This article is news reporting and analysis of a film release and a company disclosure, and it is for information only. It is not investment advice, a recommendation to buy or sell Netflix stock, or a forecast of box office or awards outcomes. Readers who plan to act on company results, ticket sales, or share-price moves should consult a licensed financial adviser who can review their own holdings. Figures and release plans reflect the company statements, Box Office Mojo ledger, and other sources cited here as of Oct. 20, 2026, and those totals, dates, and executive roles can change.