Will Smith managed to jolt the movie box office out of a fourth quarter fainting spell with a muscular $76 million opening for his sci-fi thriller, I Am Legend, which is based on the classic Richard Matheson novella that had been brought to the big screen twice before as the The Last Man on Earth (1964) and The Omega Man (1971). Smith is one of Hollywood's most bankable stars and I Am Legend, which marks his seventh straight #1 opening, scored the best December debut ever (it topped all three LOTR films) and the fourth highest winter season bow in Tinseltown history. The grosses for I Am Legend were helped by its IMAX debut where Warner Bros. cleverly added a six-minute preview of Christopher Nolan's The Dark Knight, which undoubtedly attracted a lot of hard core comics fans to the IMAX shows, which were reportedly sold out all weekend -- and the pricier IMAX tickets (up to $16 per person) helped the film earn a spectacular $21,244 per venue.
In addition to the Tor reissue ($7.99) of the original Matheson novella, which has a cover illustration from the new movie, retailers have IDW's 'illustrated novel' version ($19.95) of I Am Legend, which was adapted by Steve Niles and first published in 2005. Also, as was announced at San Diego last summer, DC's Vertigo imprint is planning to publish a collection of short comic stories (available originally online) featuring short works set in the universe of the new I Am Legend film with contributions from a number of top creators from comics (Steve Niles, Bill Sienkiewicz), video games (Jason Chan), Hollywood (screenwriter Mike Protosevich), and fiction (Orson Scott Card).
In addition to I Am Legend's spectacular debut, the kids' film, Alvin and the Chipmunks, also surpassed expectations by earning $45 million, the fourth highest non-#1 opening of all time. The two top films accounted for 75% of the total weekend box office, which was the highest ever for a non-holiday weekend in December and a whopping 47% higher than the same weekend last year. The Chipmunks' opening was actually the second highest PG debut ever in December trailing only the Chronicles of Narnia, and with little in the way of competition for the kiddie audience, Alvin and the Chipmunks looks like it could continue to surpass expectations for some time.
Last week's #1, The Golden Compass, which is doing much better overseas than it is here, dropped 65% in its second weekend and finished in third place with just over $9 million. It remains to be seen if The Golden Compass will be able to find its audience in the final two weeks of December when many school children will be on their holiday breaks.
Beowulf dropped out of the top ten (to #12), but still earned $1.3 million and brought its cumulative to $80 million. Like The Golden Compass, Beowulf has been doing better overseas, but the $150 million production will likely end up with around $90 million at the domestic box office.