Pixar’s Monsters University easily took the weekend box office crown with a stellar $82 million debut while World War Z and Man of Steel fought tooth and nail for the action movie audience.  The result was one of the strongest box office weekends of the year (topped only by Memorial Day) with the top 12 films posting a massive 47% increase over the same frame last year when Pixar’s Brave topped the charts with a $66.3 million debut.  

With Monsters U and WWZ both set to open and Man of Steel’s potent debut last week, some analysts were hoping that this weekend would set a new box office record with 3 films each earning more than $50 million. Given Pixar’s track record and the Man of Steel’s strong opening, World War Z was thought to be the potential outlier, but it appears that the zombie epic took a much bigger bite out of Superman’s audience than was expected, and the Supes movie was the only film in the trio that earned less than $50 million..
 
Monsters University, which debuted some 11.5 years after Pixar’s Monsters Incorporated, was the fourteenth Pixar film to grab the number one spot, though many analysts believed the weekend crown would go to either World War Z or Man of Steel.  Monsters University serves a prequel for the 2001 film and a reminder of just what a potent box office player Pixar is.  Directed by Don Scanlon, Monsters University garnered a superb 87% positive rating from the critics surveyed by review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes and also earned a solid "A" CinemaScore from audiences, which means that word of mouth should help drive up the film’s gross, though it will face lots of competition from a summer schedule that is loaded with animated features including Despicable Me 2, which debuts on July 3rd.

Weekend Box Office (Studio Estimates): June 21-23, 2013
	Film	Weekend Gross	Screens	Avg./ Screen	Total Gross	Wk#
1	Monsters University	$82,000,000	4,004	$20,480	$82,000,000	1
2	World War Z	$66,000,000	3,607	$18,298	$66,000,000	1
3	Man of Steel	$41,215,000	4,207	$9,797	$210,006,000	2
4	This is the End	$13,000,000	3,055	$4,255	$57,792,000	2
5	Now You See Me	$7,870,000	2,823	$2,788	$94,451,000	4
6	Fast & Furious 6	$4,725,000	2,417	$1,955	$228,413,000	5
7	The Internship	$3,425,000	1,916	$1,788	$38,365,000	3
8	The Purge	$3,412,000	2,201	$1,550	$59,428,000	3
9	Star Trek Into Darkness	$3,000,000	1,565	$1,917	$216,611,000	6
10	Iron Man 3	$2,175,000	924	$2,354	$403,120,000	8

Monsters University showed some unexpected box office power at evening shows demonstrating that Pixar’s films retain the ability to charm adults as well as children.  Forty percent of the opening weekend crowd, which was predominantly female (56%), was over 26.  Overseas the movie is also off to a strong start earning $54.5 million from debuts in 35 territories (only six of which are considered “major,” which means the movie opened in territories that in the past have provided just 48% of Pixar films’ foreign totals).
 
While most analysts expected Monsters University to do well, many felt that Paramount’s World War Z was a potential flop.  Originally budgeted at $150 million, WWZ’s release was delayed for extensive re-shooting that reshaped the entire last act of the film, and also drove its budget north of $190 million.  It now appears that the studio’s decision to double down on the film was justified, even though it might not make back its enormous cost, World War Z is not going to force the studio into a massive Battleship-like write-off.  World War Z’s $66 million debut was the biggest opening for an "original" live-action movie since Avatar.  The movie also earned $46 million overseas, though it has opened in just about 30% of the overseas markets. 

Having earned a worldwide total of $111.8 million in its debut, World War Z still has a long way to go to make it into the black, but it could happen since “original” films tend to have bigger "multiples" (the total amount a film earns divided by its debut numbers), since audiences aren’t pre-sold on the material as is often the case with franchise sequels, and don’t necessarily rush to see the film right away, instead waiting for word of mouth, which on World War Z was pretty good (a "B+" CinemaScore).  World War Z attracted an audience that was slightly female (51%) and older (67% over 25).
 
It is clear that part of World War Z’s success came at the expense of Zack Snyder’s Man of Steel, which suffered a larger than expected 65% second-week drop.  As regular readers of this column will attest, 60%+ drops are now commonplace for heavily-hyped summer blockbusters.  Snyder’s film still managed a solid $9,789 per venue average for the 3-day weekend, but it is clear that although Man of Steel is far from a flop, it also remains far from earning back its enormous cost as well.  Although the film has earned a potent $210 million in North America so far, its financial fortunes rest on the movie showing continued strength domestically through the upcoming 4th of July weekend as well as on a strong performance overseas.  Next weekend will see more competition for the action movie audience with the premiere of White House Down.
 
Sony’s "R-rated" post-apocalyptic comedy This Is the End dropped only 37.3% in its second week as it earned an estimated $13 million and brought its cumulative to $58 million, solidifying its position as the current champion among raunchy summer comedy films.  But This Is the End will face direct competition next week with the debut of the "R-rated" comedy The Heat starring Melissa McCarthy (Identity Thief) and Sandra Bullock. The equally surprising magician/caper movie Now You See Me also continues to perform well in its modest way, dropping just 29% and bringing its domestic total to $94.5 million. 
 
Fast and Furious 6 faded to sixth place during its fifth weekend in theaters.  The street-racing caper film has set a new franchise record with a worldwide total of $645.7 million, but appears to be played out now in the domestic market.  The same could be said for the failed comedy The Internship, which finished at number 7 and the highly profitable micro-budgeted horror film The Purge, which scored the summer’s biggest box office surprise three weekends ago, but faded quickly after audiences realized there wasn’t much to the film beyond its high-concept (and laughably far-fetched) premise.
 
J.J. Abrams’ Star Trek Into Darkness looks like it will end its domestic run in the neighborhood of $225 million, which is well below Abrams’ first Star Trek film, which earned nearly $258 million in North America in 2009.  STID is however doing much better than its predecessor overseas where it has earned $213 million versus just $127 million for the 2009 film.  Still STID’s worldwide total of $430 million isn’t likely to grow by very much, and the movie’s bottom line will probably still be mired in the red after the film’s theatrical release, though sales to TV and on DVD could bring it to near break even.  Some Hollywood figures are saying that a few more big flops and the current Tinseltown fascination with big-budget tentpoles could evaporate, but so far this summer it appears there have been a few big winners and lots of films that do big numbers at the box office, but not quite big enough to turn an immediate profit for the studios--death by a thousand cuts rather than a thrust through the heart.
 
One of this summer’s biggest winners, Shane Black’s Iron Man 3 managed to stay in the top ten for the 8th straight weekend.  The film has earned a 2013 best-to-date total of $403.1 million domestically and a massive $804.6 million overseas for a worldwide total of 1.2 billion that will be very hard to catch.
 
Next weekend, which will be the last before the fourth of July holiday, will see the release of two very interesting films, the "R-rated" comedy The Heat starring Sandra Bullock and Melissa McCarthy, which many analysts are predicting will be the #1 comedy release of the summer, and White House Down, an action-packed thriller starring Jamie Foxx and Channing Tatum that will provide even more direct competition for Man of Steel and World War Z.