Actress Cameron Diaz’s first acting role in almost a decade pushed her Netflix film ‘Back in Action’ to almost 50 million views in its first three days on the platform, breaking an almost three-year-old opening weekend record for an English language Netflix film.
Cameron Diaz as Emily and Jamie Foxx as Matt in "Back In Action."
"Back in Action," which debuted Jan. 17, was viewed 46.8 million times from its release date through Jan. 19, Netflix said Tuesday.
"Back in Action," which also stars Jamie Foxx, earned the best opening weekend for an English language film on Netflix since “The Adam Project” in March of 2022, Variety reported.
The film's release pushed "The Secret Life of Pets 2" and "The Secret Life of Pets" into the second and third positions after six and seven weeks in the Netflix top 10, respectively.
"Knight and Day," a 2010 action comedy starring Diaz alongside Tom Cruise, also broke into the Netflix top 10 in the week of Jan. 13 to 19, in fourth place with 5.2 million views.
In the No. 5 spot is “Carry-On,” a Christmas Netflix release that has been among the most watched movies for the last six weeks, which has been viewed 160.2 million times since its Dec. 13 release.
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"Carry-On" is the third most popular Netflix movie of all time. "Red Notice," a 2021 action comedy starring Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson, Gal Gadot and Ryan Reynolds, holds the top spot with 230.9 million views and "Don't Look Up” is second at 171.4 million. "The Adam Project," also starring Ryan Reynolds, is in the No. 4 spot with 157.6 million all time views.
Diaz, who rose to fame in the 1990s and early 2000s by starring in films like "There's Something About Mary," "Charlie's Angles" and "Shrek," hadn't appeared on screen since "Annie" in 2014. Diaz hasn't commented on if her recent role is a permanent return to acting or a one-off experience with her longtime friend Foxx, but did call the decade she spent away from set "the best 10 years" of her life, adding it allowed her to focus on being a wife and mother. In “Back in Action,” Diaz and Foxx play a married couple of former spies who are forced out of retirement when danger finds them. Diaz and Foxx have starred in two other films together: "Any Given Sunday" in 1999 and the 2014 remake of "Annie."