Fast Five, the fifth film in the Fast and the Furious street racing franchise, got the summer off to a smoking hot start with an $83.6 million debut, more than doubling the best opening of 2011 so far (Rio’s $39.2 million). Fast Five grabbed a huge 54% market share for the weekend thanks to a very robust $22,950 per theater average. Its stellar opening pushed the domestic box office up 56% from last year when the remake of A Nightmare on Elm Street bowed with $32.9 million, though the top ten films were down 6% from 2009 when X-Men Origins: Wolverine debuted with $85.1 million.

Weekend Box Office (Studio Estimates): April 29 - May 1, 2011

 

Film

Weekend Gross

Screens

Avg./

Screen

Total Gross

Wk#

1

Fast Five

$83,630,000

3,644

$22,950

$83,630,000

1

2

Rio

$14,400,000

3,708

$3,883

$103,627,000

3

3

Tyler Perry's Madea's Big Happy Family

$10,050,000

2,288

$4,392

$41,080,000

2

4

Water for Elephants

$9,125,000

2,820

$3,236

$32,263,000

2

5

Prom

$5,000,000

2,730

$1,832

$5,000,000

1

6

Hoodwinked Too! Hood vs. Evil

$4,140,000

2,505

$1,653

$4,140,000

1

7

Soul Surfer

$3,300,000

2,010

$1,642

$33,775,000

4

8

Insidious

$2,687,000

1,584

$1,696

$48,307,000

5

9

Hop

$2,557,000

3,176

$805

$105,276,000

5

10

Source Code

$2,532,000

1,645

$1,539

$48,909,000

5

 
Produced for $125 million, Fast Five has already earned $165 million worldwide and is yet to open in a number of major territories. While many franchises tend to run out steam by their fifth installment, Universal and director Justin Lin scored by reuniting the cast of the original Fast and Furious and adding Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson to up the testosterone levels even further. Fast Five has posted franchise record debuts in every market in which it has opened. In the U.S. it drew an audience that was 56% male, 52% under 25, and quite diverse (just 35% Caucasian). It will face stiff competition for its target audience from Thor next weekend, but Fast Five did earn an “A” CinemaScore from opening weekend audiences, which means it might be able to avoid the huge 60% second week drops that are increasing typical for big-budget action films.
 
While Fast Five scorched its way down the track, the other three new movies that opened nationwide tanked. Disney’s Prom earned just $5 million from 2,730 locations for a very weak $1,832 average. Predictably the generically-titled Prom drew an audience that was 82% female and 66% under 18.
 
Hoodwinked Too! Hood vs. Evil fared even worse bringing in just $4.1 million from 2,505 locations, a pathetic $1,653 average. This poorly-reviewed misfire posted a debut that was even weaker than Mars Needs Moms. Hoodwinked Too! now has the dubious distinction of the worst ever debut for a widely-released 3-D movie.
 
The opening of the 2-D comic book-based Dylan Dog was even more pitiful, earning just $885,000, though it only opened in 875 locations. The supernatural/horror/comedy genre is not exactly replete with winners, but Dylan Dog, which was adapted from Tiziano Sclavi’s bestselling Italian horror comic and starred Brandon (Superman Returns) Routh, set a new record in futility for the misbegotten category as it debuted at #16 with a per-theater average of just over a thousand dollars.
 
The top holdovers experienced slightly bigger than normal drops due largely to the fact that last weekend was Easter. Fox’s animated comedy Rio slipped 45.3% as it added $14.4 million bringing its cumulative to $103.6 million, which makes it the #3 film of the year behind Hop ($105 million) and Rango ($120 million), both of which it will certainly surpass.
 
Tyler Perry’s Madea’s Big Happy Family declined nearly 60%, while Fox’s romantic drama Water for Elephants dropped 45.8%.
 
Next weekend Marvel Studio’s Thor, directed by Kenneth Branagh, opens in more than 3,500 theaters and the “summer” movie season starts in earnest.