There isn’t much to say about the weekend box-office this week as the $78 million earned by all films in release has the potential of being broken by The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey all on its own next weekend. This was the second lowest weekend of the year as the continuing battle between James Bond and Skyfall versus Edward and Bella of The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn – Part 2 this time went to the MI6 agent.
Skyfall managed $11 million this weekend in its fifth week in release and domestically is now up to $261.6 million, while Twilight is in a rather distant second, given the totals, with $9.2 million. Breaking Dawn – Part 2, however, is now the highest grossing film in the Twilight franchise with over $751 million worldwide. Part 1 was the previous record holder with $712.2 million as the final installment blew by that one, but can it managed to cross the $800 million mark?
As for Skyfall‘s worldwide presence, it’s up to $918.2 million and has made $32 million more than The Dark Knight Rises internationally and is now Sony’s top-grossing film of all-time, besting Spider-Man 3 ($890.8m worldwide). What do you think of that?
Between Skyfall and Twilight, though, was the DreamWorks Animated feature Rise of the Guardians, which is fighting an uphill battle due to its $145 million budget. This weekend it added $10.5 million to its total, however, bringing its cume up to $61.9 million. Unfortunately, this one is dead in the water.
The weekend’s only new wide release was the Gerard Butler rom-com Playing for Keeps, which opened to a rather dismal $6 million. It wasn’t necessarily helped along by critics with a 2% rating on RottenTomatoes. Audiences did award it a B+ CinemaScore, but that’s not enough to right this ship. The big question mark with the flick is how Groupon sales were tallied as they were offered at $24 for two tickets and $15 in Groupon bucks. It’s an interesting way to get some extra money and I wonder just how many people end up using that extra $15 before it expires (that is, I’m assuming it expires).
On the prediction side of things, Laremy overshot Playing for Keeps by $2.6 million, but Will-E wasn’t fooled as his $6.05 million was best among Thursday’s reader predictions and damn near spot on.
Elsewhere, the Hyde Park on Hudson arrived in four theaters this weekend and brought in $83,000 for a $21,000 per theater average. I guess the idea of FDR getting a hand job from his distant cousin in a flower field doesn’t have the appeal Focus thought it might.
Silver Linings Playbook just missed the top ten bringing in $2.2 million from 371 theaters and while Laremy went big on expectations for End of Watch as Open Road brought it back into 1,249 theaters this weekend, the film only brought in $733,000 for a $587 per theater. Good thing for people that went, they basically had a theater to themselves to see one of the better films of the year.
And that does it for me this weekend. Next weekend will be a little more exciting as The Hobbit arrives and I Am Legend‘s December opening record of $77.2 million is in serious jeopardy. Anyone want to make any early predictions on how it will do? Remember, it’s going to be in over 4,000 theaters and on IMAX screens and in 3D. A lot of opportunity for up-charging. As for I Am Legend, it had the prologue for The Dark Knight in front of it on IMAX screens, but it didn’t have 3D and it only opened in 3,606 theaters. In short, that December record is about to be crushed!
