The Hugh Jackman-starring robot fighting saga Real Steel topped the weekend box office for the second week in a row, holding off two remakes of popular 1980s films and a bird-watching comedy that barely made the top ten.  Reversing a recent string of year-over-year victories, the box office declined 33% from the same frame last year when Jackass 3-D opened with 50.3 million.
 
Real Steel dipped a modest 40% to earn an estimated $16.3 million, which was apparently enough (though it won’t be certain until final numbers are released tomorrow) to nose out the remake of Footloose, which brought in an estimated $16.1 million.  A full 70% of the audience for Footloose was female, and 27% was under 18.  The “dance” film earned a solid “A” CinemaScore, which should translate to relatively small declines in the coming weeks, though the remake won’t likely be able to match the original’s $80 million domestic total.
 

Weekend Box Office (Studio Estimates): October 14 - 16, 2011

 

Film

Weekend Gross

Screens

Avg./

Screen

Total Gross

Wk#

1

Real Steel

$16,304,000

3,440

$4,740

$51,744,000

2

2

Footloose

$16,100,000

3,549

$4,536

$16,100,000

1

3

The Thing

$8,700,000

2,996

$2,904

$8,700,000

1

4

The Ides of March

$7,500,000

2,199

$3,411

$22,154,000

2

5

Dolphin Tale

$6,345,000

3,286

$1,931

$58,672,000

4

6

Moneyball

$5,500,000

2,840

$1,937

$57,712,000

4

7

50/50

$4,315,000

2,391

$1,805

$24,334,000

3

8

Courageous

$3,400,000

1,214

$2,801

$21,378,000

3

9

The Big Year

$3,325,000

2,150

$1,547

$3,325,000

1

10

The Lion King (in 3D)

$2,708,000

1,970

$1,375

$90,452,000

5

 
But Footloose fared far better than the remake of The Thing, which only brought in a meager $8.7 million.  So far in October horror movies haven't been able to exert their normal seasonal pull, though that may change next week with the debut of Paranormal 3.  The audience for The Thing was 57% male and 44% over 30, but the new film, which starred Mary Elizabeth Winstead and was a remake of John Carpenter’s remake of Howard Hawk’s 1951 classic, earned a poor “B-“ CinemaScore, which doesn’t bode well for its box office prospects over the next few weeks.
 
Holdovers took the fourth through eighth spots and for the most part suffered modest declines.  The George Clooney political thriller The Ides of March slipped just 28% and the inspirational Dolphin Tale fell by just 31%.  Moneyball was off 26%, while the cancer comedy 50/50 dipped just 24%.
 
In the ninth spot The Big Year, in spite of its stellar cast, opened with just $3.3 million and gives every sign of being a “big bomb.”  Fox spent $41 million on the bird watching comedy/drama, which stars Owen Wilson, Steve Martin, and Jack Black, and the film’s “B-“ CinemaScore indicates that the studio won’t be getting its money back on this one anytime soon.