Weekend Box-Office

WEEKEND BOX-OFFICE

"Kiss
you and we’re #1? M’oookay…."

Despite every other industry ailing during the
recession and everything, Hollywood has already set a new revenue
record for theatrical releases in 2009, already grossing over
$9.79 BILLION so far this year, which breaks the previous record
of $9.68 BILLION set in 2007 — and that’s not counting AVATAR and
the other X-Mas releases coming soon to a theater near you! In
fact, pundits are estimating that the annual box-office will
surpass the $10 BILLION mark in the next 10 days or so. Not bad,
not bad at all.

This week’s releases didn’t break any records
though, as Disney’s THE PRINCESS AND THE FROG went into wide
release and nabbed the #1 spot with about $25M bucks. A decent
amount, but certainly a lot less than many of the "big
animated" movies that were released this year. Now, it’s just
a matter of waiting to see if the film has "legs". And
speaking of "legs", how about Sandra Bullock and THE
BLIND SIDE, eh? The film remains in the top 2 for the 4th weekend
in a row, and adds another $15M to its bank account, which has now
ballooned up to $150M. Bullock’s own box-office record is $163M,
which she just set with THE PROPOSAL this past summer.

Speaking of records, it seems as though NEW MOON
won’t be setting any more records, despite an explosive opening
weekend just about a month ago (it opened with $140.7M, third only to THE DARK KNIGHT’S massive opening weekend and SPIDER-MAN 3). The film
should plateau around the $300M mark, as it sits around $270M
right now. In case you’re wondering how that fares on the all-time
domestic revenue list, the film is currently sitting in 43rd
place, right behind the original SHREK and right above THE
INCREDIBLES. It’s to note that the original TWILIGHT film only
grossed $193M overall.

The only new release of this week was Clint
Eastwood’s INVICTUS, which managed an "okay opening" in
3rd place and about $9M, but nothing to write to Matt Damon about.
Much like THE POLAR EXPRESS a few years ago, Robert Zemeckis’ A
CHRISTMAS CAROL started slow, but has been picking up the pace
since. The film only lost 11% of its audience from last weekend
(an extremely low amount!) and is now up to $125M in domestic
gross, despite only a $30M opening. That said, the film apparently
cost about $200M to put together.

The two films that dropped out of the top 10 this
weekend were PLANET 51 ($37M) and EVERYBODY’S FINE ($7M). Despite
a limited release, Jason Reitman’s UP IN THE AIR was in 11th place
this weekend, and should be moving into the top 10 soon as it
widens its release in the next couple of weeks.

Next week sees the release of 2 big X-Mas movies,
including the film that everyone, their uncle, their aunt and
their nieces and nephews have been waiting for all year, James
Cameron’s AVATAR!
Something called DID
YOU HEAR ABOUT THE MORGANS? starring an aging Hugh Grant and
Sarah Jessica Parker will also be opening, for counter-programming
purposes, I assume. So how much moolah do you think AVATAR will
make next weekend? VOTE
HERE.

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BOX-OFFICE ARCHIVES  HERE

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