If you were at the movies this past weekend and happened to hear crickets chirping instead of your fellow moviegoers talking, then your hearing was not deceiving you. As August heads into the home stretch, the 2010 summer movie season is (thankfully) coming to a close. Studios have begun dumping titles onto the marketplace in the hopes of making a quick pre-DVD buck. With such a weak selection to choose from, it should come as no surprise that the overall box office was down from last year at this time.
After the biggest opening (pre-inflation) of his long career, Sly Stallone’s action hit The Expendables fell by a little more than half this weekend but still managed to command the top spot. Off 53%, the film nabbed an estimated $16.5 million 3,270 screens to bring its ten-day total to $65 million. This is the first time in seventeen (!) years that a Stallone film has stayed at number one for two weeks, the last being Demolition Man. Sly and friends should wrap their domestic campaign at or near the $100 million mark which begs the question, when does The Expendables 2 get underway?
Fox’s latest film spoof from the brain trust that brought us Meet the Spartans, Disaster Movie and Epic Movie, the Twilight goof Vampires Suck, opened on Wednesday in 3,233 theaters and managed $6.4 million in mid-week sales. For the Friday-to-Sunday period, the movie grossed an estimated $12.2 million to bring its overall total to the $18.6 million mark. With a whopping 3% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes (one reviewer out there is desperate to get their name in a commercial) and probably an approval rating not much higher than that from ticket buyers, Suck should become as fast a fade as the other turkeys that filmmakers Friedberg and Seltzer have unleashed on us over the past few years.
Julia Roberts’ global search for self-discovery, the critically-panned Eat Pray Love, had a fairly respectable hold in its second weekend. Off 48%, the Sony Pictures comedy/drama consumed $12 million in estimated ticket sales to bring its ten-day total to the $47 million mark. As the film’s target audience is largely adult women, the drops over the next few weeks may not be as steep as other films with a younger demographic that will be heading back to school. Julia’s summer trip may end its run between $75-80 million domestically, a far more impressive tally than her last film, 2009’s Duplicity.
In fourth place was the new Warner Brothers comedy Lottery Ticket with $11.1 million in estimated sales from 1,973 screens. The $5,639 per screen average was the highest in the top ten, besting the $5,046 per screen average generated by The Expendables. The low-budget urban comedy showcases an ensemble that includes Bow Wow, Loretta Devine and Ice Cube.
In fifth place was the Will Ferrell and Mark Wahlberg cop comedy The Other Guys with an estimated $10.1 million and a new total of $89 million. The Sony hit should pass the $100 million mark by Labor Day. Close behind in sixth place with a $10 million debut was the Weinstein Company’s 3D horror comedy (I’m guessing it was played for laughs) Piranha 3D. Despite a surprisingly strong 80% approval rating from critics on Rotten Tomatoes, audiences were not enticed by the multi-dimensional gore and cleavage fest.
With kids heading back to school shortly and parents undoubtedly having more than their fair share of family movies over the past several months, Universal’s Nanny McPhee Returns debuted quietly over the weekend. The sequel to the 2006 hit starring Emma Thompson opened roughly 40% lower than the first film, which arrived stateside in January four years ago. The film received a strong 77% positive rating on Rotten Tomatoes. Overseas, the movie has amassed a healthy $63 million to date, which makes the soft domestic debut a bit easier to swallow for distributor Universal Pictures.
Next up from Miramax was the Jennifer Aniston and Jason Bateman pregnancy comedy The Switch which failed to deliver with only $8.1 million from 2,012 screens. In ninth place was Warner’s summer smash Inception, easing 32% in its sixth weekend to $7.6 million and a new domestic total of $261.9 million. Rounding out the top ten while dropping 53% in its second round was Universal’s hipster dud Scott Pilgrim vs. the World. With only $5 million for the weekend and $20.7 million in the bank so far, Scott will be lucky to finish his North American fight near the $30 million mark (or roughly half of its production budget).
You know the summer movie season is over when the most exciting thing being released next week is… a Christmas movie from last year. That’s right kids, next week heralds the return of James Cameron’s behemoth Avatar to 3D screens across the country (well, 700 of them anyway). Also opening next weekend is the PG-13 horror flick The Last Exorcism and the action film Takers. Predict what these films will make next weekend for a shot at Blu-ray prizes in our Weekend Box Office Prophet Game.
– Shawn Fitzgerald
