1. Taken 2 - $22.5M - $86.7M
2. Argo - $20.1M - $20.1M
3. Sinister - $18.25M - $18.25M
4. Hotel Transylvania - $17.3M - $102.2M
5. Here Comes The Boom - $12M - $12M
6. Pitch Perfect - $9.3M - $36M
7. Frankenweenie - $7M - $22M
8. Looper - $6.3M - $51.4M
9. Seven Psychopaths- $4.2M - $4.2M
10. The Perks of Being a Wallflower - $2.1M - $6.1M
A
busy weekend, with three features opening in over 2,500 theatres, along
with another two at 1,000 locations or more. Argo, Sinister and Here
Comes The Boom were all set to battle Liam Neeson and Taken 2, with
Seven Psychopaths and Atlas Shrugged: Part 2 set to back them up. And
after narrowly missing out on a top ten place last weekend, The Perks of
a Wallflower gives it one more go as it expands into 726 screens. Ahead
to next Friday and we have the return of the Paranormal Activity
franchise and the Alex Cross reboot that will see Tyler Perry stepping
out of his comfort zone for the first time.
After its $50M debut last weekend, all eyes were on whether Taken 2
could make it two in a row at the top. Despite some middling word of
mouth, the Liam Neeson picture had played well during the week, with
over $5.5M on Monday (Columbus Day) and a further $3.9M on Tuesday. By
the start of its second frame, Taken 2 was sitting on $64.2M (the
original Taken made $33M during its first full week) and got ready to
take on the newcomers. On its second Friday, the action sequel made $7M,
down 62% on its strong opening day and gave up the top spot to
Sinister. As Argo put the pressure on and Sinister began to fall back,
Taken 2 pushed ahead and reclaimed the top spot with a $22.5M weekend
total. That's a fall of 55% on last frame, which was all but expected
given the front loading associated with this sequel (not to mention the
middling word of mouth and the fresh competition). In contrast, the
first movie opened to $24.7M and dropped a near unheard of 17% in its
second weekend. At this point Taken 2 will clear $100M domestically but
may ultimately fall short of the $145M made by the first picture.
Overseas the film got off to an equally spectacular start last weekend,
clearing $55M. By Thursday it was up to $81M and was expected to have
comfortably cleared $100M by the end of play on Sunday.
Our first
new release on this busy week is the latest directorial effort from Ben
Affleck. Argo is based on the real life story of the audacious rescue
of six U.S diplomats during the Iran hostage crisis in 1979/80. The
basis for the screenplay is in part based on the memoirs of CIA Agent
Tony Mendez (who orchestrated the rescue) and a 2007 Wired magazine
article entitled 'How the CIA Used a Fake Sci-Fi Flick to Rescue
Americans from Tehran' written by Joshuah Bearman. The film follows true
events, though as Affleck (who was the bomb in Phantoms) has been quick
to note, Argo is based on a true story, as opposed to being a
true story and thus a certain amount of dramatic license has been used
to bring the events to life. After students and militants swarm the
American embassy in Iran, which results in 52 people being taken
hostage, a group of six manage to evade capture and ultimately seek
sanctuary at the Canadian Embassy. In order to get them out of Iran
safely, the CIA enlist the skills of their agent Tony Mendez, a
specialist in covert and clandestine work. Mendez comes up with the idea
of a fake film (the Argo of the title), with the idea of passing off
the six diplomats as members of the Canadian film crew, who are in Iran
to scout locations. To further cement the cover story, the CIA set up
and staff an office in Los Angeles for the fake picture and even produce
posters for inclusion in Hollywood publications. With the help of the
Canadian government (who granted the U.S citizens Canadian passports),
the plan was put into place.
The rights to produce a film based
around Bearman's article were secured in its year of publication by
George Clooney, David Klawans and Grant Heslov, but it would not be
until 2011 that the project moved forward. Ben Affleck made his
directorial debut on missing child film, Gone Baby Gone in 2007, which
he followed up three years later with crime drama The Town. He
officially signed up to direct Argo in February 2011, with casting
commencing in June. First on board the project was Alan Arkin, who was
joined by Bryan Cranston, John Goodman and Affleck himself, taking on
the role of Tony Mendez. Shooting took place in California, Washington
and Istanbul, with the first trailer debuting in May 2012. Argo debuted
at the Telluride Film Festival in August and screened at the Toronto
Film Festival back in September, to great acclaim. But controversy also
raised its head due to the film downplaying the role of the Canadian
ambassador Ken Taylor, who was instrumental in getting the Canadian
government to grant the fake passports. The director responded by
altering the final text in the film to better credit the ambassador's
contributions. With such strong notices and a subject matter a little
way from the mainstream, it was initially assumed that Argo would open
in a limited capacity, building up word of mouth before it expanded
wide. However, Warner Bros. opted to open the picture wide, taking in an
estimated 3,250 theatres. Reviews have been incredibly strong, with
Argo scoring the best notices of any of the wide releases this weekend
(It is currently 94% at Rotten Tomatoes). While the very positive
notices didn't translate to the picture winning Friday, it still had a
solid enough start of $5.9M. Unlike Sinister (See below), Argo has
blistering word of mouth, something evident in its rare A+ Cinemascore
rating. Over Saturday and into Sunday, it saw something of a boost and
added a further $14.3M, to finish the weekend in second place with a
$20.1M total. While it isn't the best opening for an Affleck directed
film (That honour stays with The Town's $23M debut) it's still a very
good start and put its well on track to recouping its $44M budget. With
the aforementioned strong word of mouth, expect Argo to play well during
the week and beyond. There's also the already-building award talk which
won't do the picture any harm at all.
The Paranormal Activity
franchise gets its yearly airing next weekend but for this week, we have
Sinister, a brand new scare flick starring Ethan Hawke. Hawke plays
true crime writer Ellison Osbourne, who along with his wife and two
children move into a house which was witness to a family slaying. Hoping
to use the murders for the basis of his latest book (with a view to
solving the crime) he is intrigued when he comes across a collection of
8mm film reels that depict not only the deaths of the previous
residents, but a number of other families. Osbourne becomes obsessed
with the footage and starts to notice a strange character appearing in
the background of them. When odd things begin to occur around the house,
he realises that he may have put his family and himself in terrible
danger. Sinister was written by Ain't It Cool News contributor C.Robert
Cargill , with assistance from Scott Derrickson, writer and director of
The Exorcism of Emily Rose. The horror flick shot around this time last
year with Hawke being joined by Juliet Rylance and Vincent D'Onofrio.
Early buzz began to build after its debut at the SXSW festival in March,
and continued to rise thanks to strong summer screenings (including a
showing at Frightfest). While the standard teaser hinted at the possible
frights on offer, it was Sinister's red band trailer that revealed its
more disturbing side. Hawke dabbled in the genre in 2010's Daybreakers
but Sinister is his first out and out horror film.
While initial
reviews were positive, as more critics weighed in, the picture dropped
to a 63% approval rating (which is still solid for the genre). Advanced
ticket sale information revealed that the movie accounted for 25-30% of
all tickets sold, meaning Sinister would at least have a good opening
day. And indeed it did, taking the top spot with $7.4M and displacing
(temporarily) Taken 2. In comparison, House at the End of the Street's
first day clocked in at $4.6M, while The Possession opened to $6M
(though admittedly on a much quieter weekend). What was worrying going
forward was Sinister's C+ cinemascore, meaning word of mouth wasn't that
strong and would have a real effect over the remainder of the weekend.
By the end of play on Sunday it had made $18.2M, which is certainly a
solid enough debut even if that initial momentum couldn't quite be kept
up. What's more, with only a $3M production budget attached, Summit have
already more than covered any financial layout and will be seeing real
profit in the coming week. Paranormal Activity 4 will give Sinister a
hard time next weekend, but ultimately that will be of little
consequence. The green-lighting of a Sinister sequel seems a foregone
conclusion even at this early stage.
Hotel Transylvania easily
bested Frankenweenie last weekend, and with no new direct competition,
managed to keep most of the family market to itself this frame. With an
$84.4M total as of Thursday, it also looked likely the film would hit
$100M within 17 days. On its third Friday on general release, the Adam
Sandler-voiced flick added a further $4.2M, on its way towards a weekend
total of $17.3M. That's down a not-bad 36% on last weekend and brings
Hotel Transylvania's cumulative gross to $102.2M (That makes the
thirteenth $100M picture of Sandler's career). In terms of recent Sony
Animation releases, this new film is tracking some way ahead of 2009's
Cloudy With A Chance of Meatballs, which had made $81.5M at this point
in its release. In fact, only The Smurfs has now made more money in
terms of Sony produced animated features, and one could argue that that
was a mix of animation and live action. With no direct competition until
Wreck-It Ralph in a fortnight's time, Hotel Transylvania should
continue to play well as it pushes towards $130M and beyond.
Here
Comes The Boom stars Kevin James as biology teacher Scott Voss. When
his school is faced with budget cuts, which would see extra curricular
activities scrapped, Voss comes up with a scheme to raise the money
himself. Having been something of an amateur wrestler in college, he
decides to become a mixed martial artist as way to earn the $48,000 the
school would need to keep its activity programmes running. Here Comes
The Boom also stars Salma Hayek as fellow teacher Bella Flores and Henry
Winkler as Marty, a colleague who will lose his job if music classes
are cut. Taking on the directorial role is Frank Coraci, who worked with
James on the 2011 release, The Zookeeper, and also directed the Adam
Sandler comedies The Wedding Singer, Click and The Waterboy. James too
has a history with the comedy actor, having played opposite him in Chuck
and Larry, Grown Ups (and its upcoming sequel) and current release,
Hotel Transylvania. Boom is also produced through Sandler's Happy
Madison production company. Kevin James shot to fame as Doug Heffernan
in King of Queens, before breaking into film opposite Will Smith in
Hitch. He also saw solo success with his lead role in Paul Blart: Mall
Cop, which made a staggering $145M in January 2009.
Shooting on
Here Comes The Boom ran from March until May of 2011 in Boston. Initial
reports pegged the film as costing just $10M to produce, but these have
since been denied and at the time of writing, no actual budget data was
available. Only Pitch Perfect would offer direct competition this frame,
and front-loading last week might have taken the edge off somewhat. In
the end, Boom barely bested the three-week old A Cappella flick, making a
subdued $3.6M on Friday (Pitch made $3M) and dropping in at fifth
place. Prospects for the new comedy didn't really improve as the weekend
wore on and it ended its first three days with a $12M total. In terms
of previous movies in which James was the main lead, this is easily his
lowest opener - The Zookeeper saw a $20M start while Paul Blart cleared
$31M. While average reviews may have been a factor for this lacklustre
start, the sheer amount of films, both new and old, may have been more
of an issue. Next weekend will give us a clearer picture as to where
Here Comes The Boom is heading and whether word of mouth is helping or
hindering.
Even with somewhat direct competition from Here Comes
The Boom (and the other new releases), Pitch Perfect still made $3M on
Friday. The well received film, a combination of Bring It On and Glee,
expanded wide last weekend and managed to make almost $15M. Back to this
frame, and the picture added a further $6.3M over Saturday and Sunday,
to bring its weekend figure to $9.3M ($36M overall). With its $17M
production budget more than covered, Pitch Perfect will turn Universal a
nice profit and should manage a couple more weekends in the top ten. It
may yet spawn a life of its own on the home market too, similar to the
aforementioned Bring It On, which received several sequels.
The
strong reviews for Frankenweenie didn't translate to box office success
last weekend, when the Tim Burton film struggled to $11.4M. The scary
nature of the feature, combined with it being shot in black and white
may have put off people, especially those with younger families. The
situation wasn't helped by the colourful, family-friendly Hotel
Transylvania being in general release either. On its second Friday the
picture added $1.7M and slipped down to eighth place. Over the remainder
of the weekend it received a slight matinee boost and made a further
$5.3M, bringing its total to $7M, a drop of 39% on its first three days.
Frankenweenie now has a ten day total of $22M and may well end up being
the second lowest grossing film of Burton's career (Ed Wood topped out
at only $5.8M, but at its peak was at only 623 locations as opposed to
the 3,000+ Frankweekenie is at).
With at least three of the new
films in competition with it (not to mention Taken 2), Looper managed a
$1.9M Friday haul. The Bruce Willis/Joseph Gordon-Levitt time travel
thriller made $6.3M this weekend, to bring its 17 day total to $51.4M.
That figure gives it a weekend to weekend drop of 48% (slightly weaker
than last weekend's 42% dip). At this point, with its $30M costs
covered, Looper should finish up with a domestic tally of around
$65-70M.
Our next new release this weekend is Martin McDonagh's
follow up to In Bruges, Seven Psychopaths. It stars Colin Farrell, Sam
Rockwell, Christopher Walken and Woody Harrelson. Farrell plays Marty, a
wannabe writer attempting to finish his 'Seven Psychopaths' screenplay.
Rockwell plays Marty's best friend Billy, a part-time dog thief, while
Walken plays Billy's partner in crime, Hans. Serious problems arise for
the trio when Billy and Hans mistakenly kidnap a dog belonging to a very
violent gangster named Charlie (Harrelson), who will do anything to see
its return. Seven Psychopaths also co-stars Tom Waits, Abbie Cornish
and Olga Kurylenko. Director McDonagh, an acclaimed playwright, made his
feature debut with the well received In Bruges back in 2008. While
promoting the film, McDonagh talked about a couple of other potential
scripts (at that point he wasn't even sure he would direct another film
despite the success of In Bruges) one of which turned out to be Seven
Psychopaths. However things didn't move forward on the project until
2011, with the first casting taking place in May of that year. Harrelson
was actually a late replacement for Mickey Rourke, who left the film
after disagreements with McDonagh (Rourke had also turned down a role in
The Expendables 2 to work on Seven Psychopaths).
Shooting took
place in late 2011 with an October 2012 release date set by CBS Films.
The picture had its world premiere at the Toronto Film Festival in
September and received some very strong notices, especially for Walken.
In Bruges had a very long, but limited release, never seeing more than
232 theatres during its 20 week run. Seven Psychopaths went out somewhat
wider (around 1,475 locations at the time of writing) and would need to
rely on those strong reviews (it's 84% Fresh at Rotten Tomatoes) and
word of mouth if it was to break out and stay ahead in a crowded
weekend. Sadly it seems Argo and Sinister stole most of its thunder, as
Seven Psychopaths crawled to just $1.3M on its first day out, only good
enough for ninth place. It would remain there for the rest of the frame,
adding only $2.9M more over the next two days. All told, the comedy
drama made $4.2M this weekend and runs the real risk of this being its
only top ten placing. Perhaps a limited roll out to build word of mouth,
before expanding on a quieter weekend, may have worked in its favour.
After
three weeks in limited release, The Perks of Being a Wallflower
expanded into 726 locations this frame, and finally managed to crack the
top ten. The well received drama, which stars Emma Watson and Logan
Lerman made $2.1M this weekend, bringing its cumulative gross to $6.1M.
Finally
this week we have Atlas Shrugged: Part 2, the sequel to the 2011 film.
Atlas Shrugged is based on the book of the same name by author Ayn Rand,
and is set in a dystopian future in which all of North America's most
productive workers have gone on strike. Critically maligned upon its
release in 1957, it has remained consistently popular in the ensuing
decades. A film adaptation had been in the works since the early 1970s
but it wasn't until producer John Aglialoro secured the rights in 1992
that things began to move forward. However, it would take Aglialoro a
further 18 years before production would began on the first film.
Critical reaction to the original picture was overwhelming negative and
from a $20M production budget, Atlas Shrugged (Part:1 of a planned
trilogy) made just $4.6M. Despite the failure, the producers managed to
secure funding for a sequel, hiring an all new cast in the process.
Reviews for this second flick were even worse, with it receiving the
infamous 0% rating at Rotten Tomatoes (the original managed 7%). On its
first day of release, Atlas Shrugged: Part 2 made just $692K, little
better than the $674K made by its predecessor (which was at 700 or so
less theatres). Come Sunday night it had a three-day total of $1.7M -
again, little different to the $1.6M made by the first film in the
series. It's hard to imagine the proposed third feature securing funding
after this second failure. Expect Aglialoro to once again directly
blame critics for the picture's failure.
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