Going into this weekend, there was a lot of talk about this being the best weekend for movies of the year, with The World’s End (our review) and You’re Next opening wide, and The Grandmaster, Short Term 12, and Drinking Buddies (our review) opening in limited release, all five over 70% recommended on RottenTomatoes. But it seems none of them made much of a dent in the consciousness of Charlie Averagedouche, and they all failed to break $10 million, domestically.
Still, we were left with consolation prizes and qualified successes, such as The World’s End becoming the highest opening film of Edgar Wright’s Cornetto trilogy (it opened slightly lower than Scott Pilgrim, but only cost a third as much to make), and The Grandmaster and Short Term 12 averaging a respectable $18,894 and $15,034 per theater. Overall, the box office was up 16% from the same weekend last year.
(Domestic numbers, based on early estimates):
1. The Butler (The Weinstein Company) – $17,018,000 ($52,275,000)
2. We’re the Millers (Warner Bros.) – $13,500,000 ($91,740,000)
3. The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones (ScreenGem/Sony) – $9,300,000
4. The World’s End (Focus) – $8,942,000
5. Planes (Buena Vista) – $8,567,000 ($59,591,000)
6. Elysium (TriStar) – $7,100,000 ($69,054,000)
7. You’re Next (LionsGate) – $7,050,000
8. Percy Jackson: Sea of Monsters (Fox) – $5,200,000 ($48,346,000)
9. Blue Jasmine (Sony) – $4,300,000 ($14,799,000)
10. Kick-Ass 2 (Fox) – $4,270,000 ($22,423,000) [Indiewire]
Other notes:
- Who would’ve predicted We’re the Millers earning more than $100 million? Certainly not me, if you kept track of our Fantasy Summer Box Office game.
- Mortal Instruments, the latest Twilight wannabe about sexy demons and white chicks, probably won’t earn back its $60 million budget. “…audience was 68 percent female and 46 percent under the age of 21. They gave it a “B+” CinemaScore.” Movie looked terrible, but 68% female and 46% under 21 is my kind of party.
- Kick-Ass 2 dropped 68% in its second weekend and nearly dropped out of the top 10, proving not every pointless cash grab is necessarily adept at grabbing cash.
- The World’s End‘s “audience was 58 percent male and 54 percent under 30 years old, and they gave it a “B+” CinemaScore.” Better movie, more like the kind of parties I’m used to going to.
I thought The World’s End would do better, but I guess you can’t expect the American public to embrace some dry art film about beer and (SPOILER ALERT) alien invasions. I mean jeez, you might as well try to make them learn Latin.