At the top of the heap is the not-so-unexpected #1 film for the weekend, The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey bringing in a very solid $36.7 million, giving the film only a 56.6% drop from its massive, record-breaking $84.6 million opening. It is now up to $149.8 million in two weeks domestically and over $288 million worldwide with more numbers still yet to come in internationally. People certainly love their Hobbitses.
Tom Cruise returns to the big screen with Jack Reacher, landing in the #2 position with $15.6 million on a $60 million budget with an A- CinemaScore in the pocket. The result is far from the $25.6 million Laremy predicted on Thursday and to look at it, it’s not a very good result. However, international dollars and potentially solid word-of-mouth through the holidays could help it as it is certainly broad enough to appeal to a large audience with a PG-13 rating versus something like the R-rated Django Unchained.
Looking over reader predictions for Jack Reacher, kudos must be handed out to Chris Etrata whose $15.6 million prediction couldn’t have been any closer.
In third was another new film in Judd Apatow‘s This is 40, which starts its box-office run with a mere $12 million and a B- CinemaScore, neither of which bode well for the film’s future prospects. It’s the worst opening for an Apatow-helmed feature to date and over $10 million less than Funny People brought in back in 2009. However, unlike Funny People, which cost $75 million to produce, 40 comes with a $35 million price tag, which will make profitability much easier, but still, Apatow’s box-office steam appears to be running out.
Laremy was a little heavy on this one, with his $14.6 million prediction and Chris Etrata once again comes up big with a $12.3 million prediction that makes me think this guy may be from the future.
We stroll down to the sixth position to find The Guilt Trip starring Seth Rogen and Barbra Streisand and while the success of Reacher and 40 are debatable, the $5.3 million this one brought in isn’t. Laremy’s $10.9 million prediction is more than double the end result and on the reader side it’s Jack standing out above the rest with a $5 million prediction.
Strolling over to see the films in limited release is where we come to the weekend’s per theater winner with Kathryn Bigelow‘s Zero Dark Thirty opening in five theaters and racking up $410,000 for a $82,000 per theater average. The film will begin expanding nationwide in January, but for now it’s certainly making some waves in New York and Los Angeles where in five days it brought in a total of $639,000.
Other limited releases include Michael Haneke‘s Amour in three theaters, bringing in $70,700; The Impossible opened in 15 theaters and only managed a paltry $139,000; and David Chase’s Not Fade Away quietly opened in three theaters to an even quieter $19,000.
Now we come to Christmas, where Django Unchained, Les Miserables and Parental Guidance will get in on the action and see what kind of chunk they can take out of the box-office. The record for a Christmas Day opening is currently $24.6 million held by Sherlock Holmes. Any of you care to go out on a limb and say one of those three films I just mentioned has any kind of shot of breaking that record? Second place is Marley and Me with $14.3 million, which, to me, seems far more doable.
