Dolphin Tale, which earned a superlative “A+” CinemaScore while finishing third last weekend, vaulted to the top of the charts with an estimated $14.2 million as it dropped just 26% from its opening frame. Dolphin Tale’s surge to the top paralleled the path of The Help, another uplifting saga that earned an “A+” rating that helped it take the box office crown during its second week, even though it wasn’t able to gain the number one spot during its debut. The well-reviewed baseball saga Moneyball dropped just 36% and finished a close second with an estimated $12.5 million, while the surprising 3-D release of The Lion King slipped 49.6% to finish in third with an estimated $11 million.
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Weekend Box Office (Studio Estimates): September 30 - October 2, 2011 | ||||||
|
|
Film |
Weekend Gross |
Screens |
Avg./ Screen |
Total Gross |
Wk# |
|
1 |
Dolphin Tale |
$14,245,000 |
3,515 |
$4,053 |
$37,516,000 |
2 |
|
2 |
Moneyball |
$12,500,000 |
2,993 |
$4,176 |
$38,469,000 |
2 |
|
3 |
The Lion King (in 3D) |
$11,057,000 |
2,340 |
$4,725 |
$79,652,000 |
3 |
|
4 |
50/50 |
$8,858,000 |
2,458 |
$3,604 |
$8,858,000 |
1 |
|
5 |
Courageous |
$8,800,000 |
1,161 |
$7,580 |
$8,800,000 |
1 |
|
6 |
Dream House |
$8,209,000 |
2,661 |
$3,085 |
$8,209,000 |
1 |
|
7 |
Abduction |
$5,650,000 |
3,118 |
$1,812 |
$19,139,000 |
2 |
|
8 |
What's Your Number? |
$5,600,000 |
3,002 |
$1,865 |
$5,600,000 |
1 |
|
9 |
Contagion |
$5,040,000 |
2,744 |
$1,837 |
$64,702,000 |
4 |
|
10 |
Killer Elite |
$4,855,000 |
2,986 |
$1,626 |
$17,439,000 |
2 |
These three holdovers topped the charts, but a trio of newcomers, all of which earned between $8 and $9 million, also helped boost the anemic box office (early October is sort of a box office desert) up 5% over the same weekend in 2011. The apparent best of the newcomers was the “cancer comedy” 50/50, which is based on a true story and stars Joseph Gordon Leavitt and Seth Rogen. 50/50 drew an audience that was 54% female and 57% under 30. With a solid “A-“ CinemaScore, 50/50 has a chance to hang around for a few weeks.
The faith-themed Courageous finished right behind, though it actually did nearly twice as well on a per-theater basis, posting the highest average ($7,580) of the weekend. Courageous managed a potent “A+” CinemaScore, so expect this movie to demonstrate strong legs in the coming weeks. The audience for Courageous was 53% female and skewed older with 77% over the age of 25.
Coming in third among the newbies was the haunted house movie Dream House, which brought in a mere $8.2 million, far below other scary domicile movies like The Amityville Horror, which debuted with $23.5 million. Dream House, which stars Daniel Craig and Rachel Weisz, earned a pitiful 5% positive rating from the critics collected by review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, but the opening weekend audience, which was 54% female and 62% under 25, at least gave the film a mediocre “B” CinemaScore. Still the stink of the “bomb” permeates every room of Dream House, which will likely have a very short run in theaters.
The worst performer of a quartet of widely released new films was What’s Your Number?, which starred Anna Faris as a woman who looked up her former lovers to see if she might have failed to recognize “Mr. Right.” The movie posted the fifth worst opening ever for a film released in over 3,000 theaters (and it also had the benefit of a major TV ad campaign). Predictably the audience was predominantly female (63%) and older (63% over 25).