In a contemporary Hollywood dominated by big-budget action franchises and expensive animated features, there is not much of the old star system left, so it is nice to see an unabashed star vehicle like The Equalizer, which stars Denzel Washington in a loose remake of an old CBS TV series about a populist avenger, who comes to the aid of the powerless, top the weekend box office.  The Equalizer earned a solid $35 million, making it Washington’s third biggest opening ever, and Laika’s stop-motion animated The Boxtrolls produced that company’s best debut so far.  Together the two newcomers helped Hollywood stay on the plus side for the second week in a row as the total of the top 12 films was 1.6% higher than the same weekend last year when Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs 2 debuted with $34 million.
 
The Equalizer reunited Washington with director Antoine Fuqua (Training Day) in an "R" rated action film that is easily the biggest "R" rated film September debut ever.  The film’s audience, which skewed older (65% over 30), but was nearly evenly split between the genders (52% male), gave the film a solid "A-" CinemaScore, which should keep The Equalizer in theaters for quite some time--and, barring a box office collapse over the next few weeks, should also insure that Denzel will get to make his first sequel, if he so chooses.
 
Last week’s top film, the dystopian teen science fiction drama The Maze Runner, earned an estimated $17.5 million, dropping just 46.2% as it slipped to second place, just a bit ahead of The Boxtrolls according to preliminary figures.  The Maze Runner, which cost just $34 million to produce, has already earned $58 million in the domestic market.  While it is not a "hit" on the scale of The Hunger Games, The Maze Runner demonstrates the continuing viability of the dystopian teen drama in today’s market.
 
Laika’s The Boxtrolls earned an estimated $17.25 million, the biggest opening in the Oregon-based stop-motion house’s brief history, though not by much (and not when adjusted for ticket price inflation)--Coraline opened with $16.8 million in 2009, and ParaNorman with $14.1 million in 2012.  Boxtrolls earned a "B+" CinemaScore, and undoubtedly benefited from a lack of animated competition, though, like all of Laika’s excellent productions, The Boxtrolls probably won’t reach the audience it deserves.  Unfortunately it appears that the modern day audience’s preference for slick computer animation over stop-motion will always punish entrants from the latter category, no matter how good the quality of the storytelling.
 
Shawn Levy’s dramatic comedy This Is Where I Leave You slipped just 39.4% as it earned $7 million and secured fourth place.  So far this more "personal" film from a director of successful big-budget comedies (A Night at the Museum) appears to be doing OK, with a domestic total of $22.6 million so far versus a cost of $19.8 million.
 
Warner Bros. family film, Dolphin Tale 2 also managed to demonstrate some "legs," dropping just 45.5% as it ran its domestic total to $33.6 million.  With a $36 million cost and only $3 million in overseas earnings so far, this very serviceable family movie still has a long way to go to turn a profit.

Sony’s "PG-13" home invasion thriller No Good Deed was hurt a bit by competition from The Equalizer.  It dropped 53% and fell to #6, but the $13.2 million production is already comfortably in the black with earnings of $46.6 million in the domestic market.
 
The Liam Neeson "R" rated action movie A Walk Among the Tombstones really took it on the chin from The Equalizer as it fell 67% in its second frame, earning just $4.2 million and falling to 7th place.  The future of this potential franchise based on the hardboiled detective novels of Lawrence Block is definitely in danger--and Universal has only itself to blame for debuting A Walk just one week before the similarly-themed The Equalizer.
 
Meanwhile James Gunn’s Guardians of the Galaxy remained in the Top Ten for the ninth week as it earned $3.8 million to bring its domestic total to $319 million.  Guardians has now surpassed the domestic total for the original Iron Man movie ($318 millon) and trails only Iron Man 3 and The Avengers among Marvel Studios’ productions in the domestic market.
 
Another late summer hit, the Michael Bay-produced Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles has just about run out its string as it fell to #10, but the film should finish its run with a domestic total north of $190 million.  It should eventually surpass 22 Jump Street, which is currently the 10th highest grossing film of the year in the domestic market.
 
Kevin Smith’s horror opus Tusk dropped 67.3% in its second frame as it brought in a pitiful $617 per theater.  With a cumulative of just $1.4 million, it appears that Tusk will finish below the director’s "Mendoza Line," which was established at $2.1 million by Mallrats in 1995.  This is unfortunate, because Tusk deserved a better fate--this is a movie with true "cult film" potential.
 
Be sure to check back here next week, when the fall "adult" movie season begins in earnest with the release of the highly-anticipated David Fincher-directed adaptation of Gillian Flynn’s Gone Girl starring Ben (Batman) Affleck, along with the debut of The Conjuring horror movie spin-off Annabelle, and the undeniable spectacle of Nicholas Cage going "apocalyptic" (in the Biblical sense) in a remake of the Rapture-ridden Left Behind.

--Tom Flinn