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SATURDAY PM/SUNDAY AM, 5TH UPDATE: Here’s how the North American box office is shaping up for this weekend based on Friday, Saturday, weekend and cumulative grosses. It was an overall $129 million weekend, which is still down (-12%) compared to last year’s fired-up Alice In Wonderland 3D totals.
1. Battle: Los Angeles (Sony) NEW [3,417 Theaters]
Friday $13.5, Saturday $3.7M, Weekend $39M
Sony Pictures’ PG-13 sci-fi actioner Battle: Los Angeles opened as the big #1 this weekend with $13.5M Friday and +2% for $13.7M Saturday. With the studio claiming the pic only cost $70M (I don’t buy it), it met the lower end of expectations of weekend grosses around $36M. That’s Sony’s fourth consecutive #1 film debut this year following The Green Hornet, Just Go With It and The Roommate. The film received a “B” overall CinemaScore, but an “A” from young men under age 18 and an “A-” from all moviegoers under 25. Directed by Jonathan Liebesman, produced by Neal Moritz and Ori Marmur, and written by Chris Bertolini, the pic had a very fresh-looking marketing campaign overseen by Jeff Blake and Marc Weinstock with exec Doug Belgrad. It didn’t hurt that the studio also generated a lot of press timed to the anniversary of an actual 1942 UFO sighting in Los Angeles that prompted a full military response including an all-out assault along the coast with artillery. Fast forward to nowadays: sorry, but I suspect that LA would be the last place on earth to become the last stand for mankind. (Dogs or dolphins, yes. Mankind, no.) The film opened day and date in 33 territories this weekend, including Mexico, Russia, Korea, and the UK, and earned $16.7M with mostly #1 debuts, for a worldwide total of $52.7M.
2. Rango (Paramount) Week 2 [3,923 Theaters]
Friday $5.5M, Saturday $10.2M, Weekend $23M (-39%), Cume $68.6M
Paramount’s winner from last weekend, the toon Rango, stayed a strong #2.
3. Red Riding Hood (Warner Bros) NEW [3,030 Theaters]
Friday $5M, Saturday $5.7M, Weekend $14.1M
Warner Bros’ unfortunately titled Red Riding Hood performed much softer than the predicted weekend of $20M — only $14.1M. (Every time I saw a trailer, it reminded me of M. Night Shyamalan’s dreadful The Village…) It failed to meet even the studio’s lowered expectations Friday and Saturday as Spring Break begins to kick off. Teen girls, for whom the $39M-budget movie was aimed, never showed up in the droves that Warner Bros had hoped since director Catherine Hardwicke couldn’t attract her Twilight fans (teen girls and their moms). Not even an American Idol marketing integration ploy helped. The film was positioned as a re-imagined haunting of a classic legend complete with love triangle, which was treated as a secondary element throughout the marketing campaign compared to highlighting the “Who Is The Wolf?” mystery. Though the film was counter-programming the male-targeted Battle: Los Angeles, Warner Bros hoped to engage males on a secondary level. But, c’mon, what guy is going to a movie titled Red Riding Hood?
4. The Adjustment Bureau (MRC/Universal) Week 2 [2,847 Theaters]
Friday $3.4M, Saturday $5.5M, Weekend $12M (-46%), Cume $38.4M
MRC/Universal’s holdover The Adjustment Bureau stayed #4, down only 46% from a week ago.
5. Mars Needs Moms (Imagemovers/Disney) NEW [3,117 Theaters]
Friday $1.8, Saturday $3.1M, Weekend $6.8M
But the movie that Hollywood was talking about all weekend was Disney’s Mars Needs Moms 3D. Why? Because the Dick Cook leftover wound up one of the biggest money losers of all time. It cost $150M but, even with the higher 3D ticket prices, it pulled in the pittance of only $6.8M this weekend – that’s right all weekend. ”It’s about as bad of an animated miss as possible,” one rival studio exec emailed me. It’s rare that any Disney toon flops at all, much less this badly, even though it’s based on the book by author and illustrator Berkeley Breathed, the Pulitzer Prize winner for his comic strip “Bloom County”. But my insiders say this movie is why, after Rich Ross screened it, Disney a year ago shuttered Robert Zemeckis’ Imagemovers Digital, which also produced the blockbuster Disney’s A Christmas Carol. (Of course, Cook’s slate also included that as well as last year’s huge moneymakers Alice In Wonderland and Toy Story 3). It opened in 14 territories overseas, repping 25% of the international market, and made just $2.1M.
Here’s the rest of the Top 10:
6. Hall Pass (New Line/Warner Bros) Week 3 [2,555 Theaters]
Friday $1.5M, Saturday $2.2M, Weekend $5.1M, Cume $34.9M
7. Beastly (CBS Films/Sony) Week 2 [1,959 Theaters]
Friday $1.6M, Saturday $2.1M, Weekend $5M (-48%), Cume $16.9M
8. Just Go With It (Sony) Week 5 [2,398 Theaters]
Friday $1.2M, Saturday $1.6M, Weekend $4M, Cume $93.9M
It’s now clear that Sony’s Just Go With It will be another Adam Sandler $100M hit.
9. The King’s Speech (The Weinstein Co) Week 16 [1,768 Theaters]
Friday $940M, Saturday $1.7M, Weekend $3.6M, Cume $129M
10. Gnomeo & Juliet 3D (Disney) Week 5 ( [2,585 Theaters]
Friday $835K, Saturday $1.8M, Weekend $3.5M, Cume $89M
Meanwhile, Paramount’s Justin Bieber: Never Say Never 3D passed $70M, which puts the concert biopic well past Disney’s Miley Cyrus/Hannah Montana concert movie, which finished at $65.3M.
Editor-in-Chief Nikki Finke - tip her here.
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RRH looks like crap–surprised they didn’t pull out “from the director of twilight” –totally DOA. Battle: la was totally mindless but fun. Marketing was excellent on that one. Mars is a just a disaster all around — nothing else needs to be said about that.
I can’t believe that RRH is in the single digits on Rotten tomatoes, wow. I wonder how they will screw up Akira.
Mars Needs Moms will be followed by a sequel titled Disney Needs Dollars. If you won’t spend your money on Mars then please spend it on some of our other fine Disney products at your local Disney Store. We need money damn it do you all think it grows on trees here? Well it doesn’t if it did we’d know about it. We spend more money than we make on our movies the only reason we’re still afloat is because of all our merchandising. Perhaps we should have done Mars Needs Moms as a Pirates of the Caribbean sequel it would be successful. Oh well too late now. Where are accountants they’re very clever they’ll know how to write this off so we won’t be hurt too badly.
MARS NEEDS MOMS lost me at it’s title. What were they thinking? I read that title and I have zero desire to see it. No wonder it flopped.
I find it prescient that the movie spoilers website it still seeking a spoiler submission for MNM. That speaks to how few people are going to see it. of course, its target audience (kids) isn’t usually who would write for the website, But not even the lure of a $10 itunes gift card is getting a review of it.
So it’s unbelievable that “Battle:LA” cost 79 million, but we can believe that “District 9″ cost 30 million? Sure “Battle:LA” has a lot of FX work, but it doesn’t really have any stars and it is basically a FPS come to life.
If you told me “Transformers: Dark Side of the Moon” cost 79 million, I’d be skeptical. But not this movie.
Wrong. Zemeckis recently met with McCartney to show him tests and conceptuals
I LOVE that Aaron Eckhart & Michelle Rodriguez, two underrated actors, co-headlined a #1 film.
That’s not technically true. They were billed below the explosions.
This could be a breakout, career defining movie for Eckhart. We need an American action hero under 70.
Why are people interested in seeing Battle LA — i’m not trying to be antagonistic here — but the trailer was horrible and didn’t have must see written all over it. The only reason I plan to see it is because of Aaron Eckhart. I saw skyline with great excitement only to be sooooo disappointed. So battle LA watchers — why did you all go out and see it, i’m curious to know.
Good to even odds ‘Mars…” when it is all said and done will do just fine at the box office and international receipts will more than offset any domestic shortcomings. Money is money wherever it comes from. This is the kind of film made for world audiences.
Mars Needs Moms is gonna recover when it hits international markets. That’s the beauty of being a Disney.
1.8 mil? Whoa. Weak. Still, Disney deserves congratulations for managing to come up with an animated movie that’s even uglier than Rango.
I’m not opposed to a Yellow Submarine remake – as long as it’s not in motion capture. I’d love to see Pepperland rendered in the same lush lovely CGI that was used for Tangled. Could be amazing.
THE VILLAGE is probably better than any of the films currently on the North American box-office top 10.
“The Kings Speech?”
Agreed
“Battle LA is fun.” This is where Dan Aykroyd would bellow out, “Jane, you ignorant slut.”
With America up to its eyeballs in never-ending wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, Battle LA is nothing more than a war recruiting film of the first magnitude. I’d love to see the producers go on record about how much of their financing for the film or Battle LA’s mega budget advertising campaign came from the US government.
Now here’s a question for all you trained professionals who pissed on low budget Skyline: can one of you please explain how Battle LA’s trailer, one of the best edited/movie trailer soundtracks of all time, not have the trailer’s spectacular soundtrack crescendo, in the actual film?
Their financing came from a Japanese comglomerate named Sony. Knowing Sony half of it probably cam efrom a private film financing company named Relativity.
Nikke – why do you think title “Red Riding Hood” is bad? What else should they have called it?
They should have called it “Twilight: Dawn of Red Riding Hood” then all the twihards would have been in a frenzy to see it.
Not if it didn’t have Rpatz and Kstew. You might think twihards are mindless hormonal tweens, teens and cat ladies – but the chemistry they bring to the love story, is what puts butts in seats. If this Shiloh douche had been cast in Twilight w/ say, Ashley Greene as Bella – it would have been flop city.
Battle LA was as good as I thought it was going to be. The reviews aren’t accurate. They make it seem as though BLA was another Matt Damon Green Zone which was a terrible film. Shaky camera and close up shots aside.
Mars Needs Mom animation is bad. It looks dark and unfriendly. Add the weird plot and that equals a flop.
Red Riding Hood – seemed like the Village redux. A wasted attempt to reach Twilight fans.
BATTLE: LOS ANGELES had a “fresh looking marketing campaign”??? Really? Says who? Sony? Interesting, because the spots look almost IDENTICAL to the CLOVERFIELD campaign a lot of us worked on for Paramount.
Couldn’t disagree more, you Paramount shill. Cloverfield sold mystery and no one knew what was really happening. If you saw BLA you’d recognize what a great job they actually did. Don’t be a hater because Sony didn’t hire you on this.
There was a period when Bay talked about doing LOGJAMMERS in this style of animation. Can you imagine the role of Ralph Hiv animated???
What exactly does Bruno Mars intend to do with these moms?
I remember being creeped out by the trailer for POLAR EXPRESS and I stayed away. But on an IMAX 3D reissue I did go see it and saw some of the true potential of 3D. I could understand why Zemekis was enthralled but hoped he would grow and enhance the combined techniques and storytelling the way others have.
But mostly I am writing to defend Dick Cook. He was a tremendous force and having come up through the ranks starting as a worker in Disneyland in Orlando, he knew and loved the company. I was lucky enough to have had several meals with him and he cared about this company more than anyone, keeping a balance between the bottom line and the proper care and feeding of the brand. Did he make mistakes? Doesn’t everyone? But how can he be blamed for MARS NEEDS MOMS? Because it was one of many possible projects on the list while he was there? Was it actually made under his watch? Did he have anything to do with the marketing campaign? I don’t think so.
Batttle LA rocked! Fun without having to worry about the hollywood liberal lessons.
Love these early, early b.o. projections. Why did it take so long to get them? (Leave it to Nikki!)
Back in the day, as a GM at an AMC 12-plex, I could readily project a weeks gross shortly after the first Friday matinee started.
That being said, it would seem that industry toppers should stay on good terms with the likes of the GM at AMC Empire 25.
In The Lion King, the King dies and Simba believes he was the one who was responsible for his father’s death. Terribly upsetting message for the kids yet a huge hit as a film and Broadway musical. Go figure.
How will Gnomeo make it to 4.5M after only making 843k on Friday?
Does anyone know where to get the tracking numbers on the web, like the % of total awareness, % of definite interest etc?
The mars movie looked so good to me. I think the name ruined it. the title needs to be a lot simpler for people to be interested.