"We have some modest expansions [upcoming] where we hope to get to a little past 100 [theaters]," Fox Searchlight distribution president Stephen Gilula said Sunday morning. "The film is playing extremely well in some of the major cities and much more modestly in the small markets. It's an urban movie and it's a sophisticated college town film holding extremely well in cities like Cambridge and Berkeley, but less well in the smaller cities. We've held extremely well in Manhattan.
"I'm pleased that we've held our own against all these big [specialized] movies that have opened [such as The Man Who Wasn't There from] the Coen Brothers and Amélie and Novocaine. There's a lot of film in the market right now. This fall all these markets are getting very crowded. So we're pleased that we're holding our own with such a very challenging film like this, but there's a core audience that's very devoted to it. And we're, of course, eyeing the Academy Awards and the chance to be the third animated feature [nominated for the new best animated feature category]."
WEEKEND COMPARISONS
Key films -- those grossing more than $500,000 -- took in approximately $161.03 million, up about 7.41 per cent from the comparable weekend last year when key films grossed $149.91 million.
This weekend's key film gross was up about 32.69 percent from last weekend of this year, when key films took in approximately $121.35 million.
Last year, Universal's first week of How The Grinch Stole Christmas was first with $55.82 million at 3,127 theaters ($17,851 per theater); and Paramount's opening week of Rugrats In Paris -- The Movie was second with $22.72 million at 2,934 theaters ($7,743 per theater). The top two films one year ago grossed $78.5 million. This year, the top two films grossed an ESTIMATED $116.5 million.
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