Take that, sequels! Originality in the form of Super 8 reduced the competition to anything but #1 at the box office over the weekend. Half of the top ten films were sequels: #2 X-Men: First Class, #3 The Hangover Part II ($17.667 million), #4 Kung Fu Panda 2 ($16.543 million), #5 Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides and #10 Fast Five. With the sequel success this summer (it’s not even the middle of June yet!), are we fated for series with sequels or is the likes of Super 8 going to alter the tides of Hollywood’s greenlighters?
The J.J. Abram-directed/Steven Spielberg-produced Super 8 achieved #1 status with $35.451 million with $1 million from limited sneak previews on Thursday. The total domestic gross for its premiere weekend was estimated at $25 to $30 million but those in the movie theater industry speculated that the movie would only bring in $20 million. The low estimates were due to the marketing of the movie as the trailers revealed nothing more than a bunch of kids with a camera, a train crash and missing dogs. Super 8 is the first original, live-action non-sequel movie to debut at #1 in just shy of three months (Bradley Cooper’s Limitless previously held that spot). Internationally, the movie brought in only $6.7 million. With good reviews and Abrams/Spielberg fans, Super 8 will hopefully top its $50 million budget.
X-Men: First Class‘s second week’s total domestic gross equaled$24.128 million with a 56.2% drop. The more than 50% drop was consistent with X-Men (57%) and X2 (53%), and bested X-Men: The Last Stand (67%) and X-Men Origins: Wolverine (69%) though the total numbers are nothing to shout about.
The fourth Pirates movie, On Stranger Tides, is at a worldwide gross of $886.873 million with this weekend’s $10.945 million domestic contribution. It still trails The Curse of the Black Pearl‘s domestic total gross of $305.413 million (the lowest of the series) but is closing in on At World’s End‘s $963.42 million total worldwide total gross. It shouldn’t be a problem as it’s only been in theaters for a little over three weeks compared to At World’s End‘s 19 weeks.
#9 Thor is hanging on after a three spot drop with $2.435 million adding up to a $173.664 million total domestic box office. It will be difficult for Marvel’s Thor and friends to stay in the top ten as DC Comics is jumping into the summer mix.
Check out ‘What To Watch – Theater Edition’ this Friday for this week’s new movie releases…he’s hot, hot and green.
Feed me at sharon@horrorhaven.com
