Weekend Box-Office: July 8-10, 2011

Last Updated on August 5, 2021

Money,
money, money…

The latest TRANSFORMERS movie
is in full gear now, as it retains the #1 spot during its second
weekend of release, increases its domestic total to 261M — which
makes it the biggest movie of the year so far (see below) — and
increases its worldwide total to $645M, making it the second
biggest international movie of the year, behind the latest PIRATES
OF THE CARIBBEAN flick, which has made 1.02B so far this year.
Here are the 2011 top 5 movies so far, according to their domestic
receipts:

1. TRANSFORMERS: DARK OF THE
MOON: $261M
2. THE HANGOVER: PART II: $250M
3. PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN 4: $236M
4. FAST FIVE: $209M
5. THOR: $178M

In second place this weekend,
was the latest R-rated comedy release entitled HORRIBLE BOSSES.
The film managed a $28M opening, which seems to be in the same
ballpark as the other R-rated original releases (if you don’t
count the HANGOVER sequel). Here are the opening weekend
grosses of the other 3 R-rated comedies this summer, along
with their domestic total so far in parentheses:

THE HANGOVER: PART II: $86M
($251M)
BAD TEACHER: $32M ($79M)
HORRIBLE BOSSES: $28M 
BRIDESMAIDS: $26M ($158M)

Kevin James’ latest “goof
fest” THE ZOOKEEPER also generated some decent dollars in its
debut (3rd place with $21M), but couldn’t outdo his previous
starring film’s debut (PAUL BLART: MALL COP opened with $32M in
2009 and ended up grossing $146M) and may have a tough time
recouping its $80M budget, unless “word of mouth”
spreads nicely and fast.

Despite dropping to 4th place
in its third week of release, Pixar’s CARS 2 doesn’t seem to be
bowling anyone over, and is currently sitting in last place
on Pixar’s
total grosses list with $148M in total, behind A BUG’S LIFE
($162M) and TOY STORY ($191M). Pixar films usually have
“legs”, but they also usually have “good word of
mouth”, which this mediocre sequel doesn’t seem to have. I
was personally blown away by how few people considered it their
“favorite movie of the summer so far” in our POLL
from this past week (only 6 people out of 3,274 voters considered
it their fave). Ironically, it was one of Pixar’s most expensive
films to make, costing an apparent $200M.

The two films to get bounced
from the top 10 this weekend were BRIDESMAIDS which had spent the
previous 2 months in the top 10 and has currently grossed a
total of $158M and Woody Allen’s most successful film since the
last 80s, MIDNIGHT IN PARIS, which fell out of the top 10 but has
now generated $39M in revenues (if it makes another $1.5M before
it departs from theaters, it will become his most successful movie
of all-time — 1986’s HANNAH AND HER SISTERS currently
holds that title with $40M). Since 1966, Allen has directed 47
feature films.

Next week sees the release of WINNIE
THE POOH which apparently runs for a whole 57 minutes
(yipes!), but more importantly, HARRY
POTTER AND THE DEATHLY HALLOWS: PART 2, which is the final
installment of the world’s
most successful movie franchise (at least until someone
figures out a way to stretch it out some more). When you consider
that Part 1 of the DEATHLY HALLOWS film opened with $125M last
year and currently sits in 5th
place for the biggest opening weekends of all-time, how much
$$$ do you think the latest POTTER flick will open with next
weekend? VOTE
HERE!!!