Genndy Tartakovsky’s Hotel Transylvania and Rian Johnson’s Looper took the top two spots at the box office with estimated totals of $43 million and $21.2 million respectively. The two Sony releases almost single-handedly ended Hollywood’s late summer/early fall losing streak as they boosted this weekend’s box office total a robust 20.9% over the same frame last year when A Dolphin Tale topped the charts with a $19.2 million total. Universal’s a cappella musical Pitch Perfect landed in 5th place even though it was only in 335 theaters, while Fox’s anti-teachers’ union film Won’t Back Down bombed as it debuted in 10th place earning just $2.7 million from over 2,500 theaters, and Dredd 3D dropped 63.7% from its less-than-impressive debut and fell out of the top ten in only its second weekend.
Hotel Transylvania, which features a voice cast of well-known actors including Adam Sandler, didn’t wow the critics (only 42% positive on Rotten Tomatoes), but audiences loved the cartoon incarnations of the familiar monster characters, giving the movie a solid "A-" CinemaScore. Hotel Transylvania set a new record for September weekend debuts easily topping the previous record holder, Sweet Home Alabama’s total of $35.6 million. Hotel Transylvania’s Saturday total of $19 million was also a new single-day September record. Hotel Transylvania also set a new debut record for Sony Pictures Animation unit, which had been held by The Smurfs, which bowed last year with $35.6 million. With good word of mouth and little in the way of competition for the family audience in coming weeks, Hotel Transylvania, which cost $85 million to produce, will likely finish its domestic run with well over $100 million.
| Weekend Box Office (Studio Estimates): September 28 - 30, 2012 | ||||||
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| Film | Weekend Gross | Screens | Avg./ Screen | Total Gross | Wk# |
| 1 | Hotel Transylvania | $43,000,000 | 3,349 | $12,840 | $43,000,000 | 1 |
| 2 | Looper | $21,200,000 | 2,992 | $7,086 | $21,200,000 | 1 |
| 3 | End of Watch | $8,000,000 | 2,780 | $2,878 | $26,169,000 | 2 |
| 4 | Trouble with the Curve | $7,530,000 | 3,212 | $2,344 | $23,726,000 | 2 |
| 5 | House at the End of The Street | $7,154,000 | 3,083 | $2,320 | $22,225,000 | 2 |
| 6 | Pitch Perfect | $5,200,000 | 335 | $15,522 | $5,200,000 | 1 |
| 7 | Finding Nemo (3D) | $4,066,000 | 2,639 | $1,541 | $36,475,000 | 3 |
| 8 | Resident Evil: Retribution | $3,000,000 | 2,381 | $1,260 | $38,700,000 | 3 |
| 9 | The Master | $2,745,000 | 856 | $3,207 | $9,633,000 | 3 |
| 10 | Won't Back Down | $2,700,000 | 2,515 | $1,074 | $2,700,000 | 1 |
Sony also grabbed second place with Looper, a high-concept, time-traveling science fiction epic starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Bruce Willis. Looper is not only set in the future, it is also a sort of a harbinger of things to come. The film was a co-production with the Chinese, and it is expected to gross slightly more this weekend in China ($25 million) than it did here in North America. Note that much of Marvel’s Iron Man 3 will be shot in China, which should give that film (like Looper) easy entry into the tightly-controlled Chinese film theater market. Looper pleased the critics no end earning a stellar 92% positive rating from the critics on Rotten Tomatoes. The film earned an "OK" "B+" CinemaScore from opening weekend audiences, who weren’t quite as impressed as the critics, though the fact that the box office total for the film was up 28% on Saturday is a strong indication that it did receive strong word of mouth recommendations from those who did see it. The "R" rated film attracted an audience that was predominantly male (60%) and older, with 70% of the ticket-buyers over 25 years old.
Last week’s winner, the gritty cop drama End of Watch, slipped just 39.2% as it added an estimated $8 million to its total. The Clint Eastwood-starring Trouble With the Curve was right behind with an estimated $7.5 million, while the critically-panned horror thriller House at the End of the Street, which stars The Hunger Games’ Jennifer Laurence, hung tough at #5 with an estimated total of $7.15 million. Those who were predicting a swift demise for the clichéd and confused House, which earned a pitiful 12% positive rating on Rotten Tomatoes, underestimated the drawing power of its talented young star.
Universal’s Pitch Perfect, which stars Anna Kendrick, earned an estimated $5.2 million from just 335 theaters thanks to a stellar $15,522 per theater average, the best of any film out this weekend. Pitch Perfect, which has been described as a sort of Glee with college students attracted a predominantly female crowd (74%) and earned a stellar "A" CinemaScore, which certainly bodes well when the film goes into wider release next weekend. Another limited release (at least so far) film, The Weinstein Company’s Scientology-skewering The Master, earned an estimated $2.7 million from just 856 locations.
The somewhat controversial Won’t Back Down earned just $2.7 million from 2,515 locations for a pitiful debut average of just over $1,000 per venue. The film, which stars Viola Davis and Maggie Gyllenhaal, has provoked criticism from Teachers’ Unions, who didn’t appreciate playing the villain’s role in this saga about the reform of an underperforming urban school.
The comic book-based Dredd 3D plummeted out of the Top Ten in just its second week in theaters as it earned just $2.3 million. So far Dredd has earned just $10.9 million in North America and a similar total overseas. It has a very long way to go to make back its $50 million cost. It now appears that this new Judge Dredd film will be hard pressed to earn more than $15 million domestically, and that the best hope for this film is that it eventually becomes something of a cult hit on DVD.
Another comic book film is approaching the end of its run. The Dark Knight Rises is now down to 655 theaters, and it earned just $800,000 this weekend. So far Christopher Nolan’s final Batfilm has earned $444.4 million, and should finish its domestic run under $450 million, well behind The Dark Knight’s domestic total of $533 million. But The Dark Knight Rises has more than made up for this domestic deficit overseas and should finish at least $75 million ahead of its predecessor’s global total.
Watch out for Summit Entertainment’s The Perks of Being a Wallflower, which earned an estimated $1.1 million from just 102 theaters. As this film expands its stellar $11,147 per venue average will doubtless drop, but it should be interesting to see if this film about a band of misfit teens, which stars Harry Potter’s Emma Watson, will have what it takes to be a mainstream hit.
Be sure to check back next week to see if a new batch of films headed by Taken 2, the sequel to surprise action film hit starring Liam Neeson, Tim Burton’s B&W stop-motion animated Frankenweenie, the heavily-advertised horror film Sinister, and the erotic thriller The Paperboy can keep Tinseltown’s winning streak going.
