But moviegoers chose to stay away from the latest crop of sober Academy Awards hopefuls, including: Ben Affleck's Gone Baby Gone, which opened in fifth place with $6 million; Reese Witherspoon and Jake Gyllenhaal's Rendition, which debuted in ninth with $4.1 million; and Halle Berry and Benicio Del Toro's Things We Lost in the Fire, which failed to reach the top 10 list, grossing only $1.6 million.
"Fall is the season of the serious movie, and it seems like audiences in a way are resisting the serious movie right now," Paul Dergarabedian, president of box-office tracker Media By Numbers told The Associated Press. "Audiences are finding their horror or their intensity in real life, and they're not looking for it in the movies."
Further proof that movie fans want fun over adversity: A 3-D version of Disney's Halloween perennial Tim Burton's the Nightmare Before Christmas came in at No. 8 with $5.1 million and had a better rate of return per-theater than any of the new wide releases.
The Top 12 movies took in a total of $79.7 million, down 10.24 percent from last year’s total of $88.8 million and down 4.95 percent from last weekend’s total of $83.8 million.
The Top Three films at the box office this time last year: Buena Vista’s The Prestige, which opened at No. 1 with $14.8 million in 22,81 theaters, averaging $6,489 per theater; Warner Bros. The Departed, which stayed in second place in its third week with $13.4 million in 3,005 theaters, averaging $4,480 per theater; and Paramount’s Flags of Our Fathers, which opened in third with $10.2 million in 1,876 theaters, averaging $5,461 per theater (Click here to read last year's box office report).
BOX OFFICE TOP 10 ESTIMATES
(Source: Exhibitor Relations, Inc.)
No. 1: 30 Days of Night (Sony, R)
• Gross: $16 million
• Weeks opened: NEW!
• Theaters: 2,855
• Per-theater average: $5,604
No. 2: Tyler Perry's Why Did I Get Married? (Lionsgate, PG-13)
• Gross: $12.1 million (-43%)
• Weeks opened: 2
• Theaters: 2,034 (+23)
• Per-theater average: $5,949
• Cume to date: $38.8 million
No. 3: The Game Plan (Buena Vista, PG)
• Gross: $8.1 million (-26%)
• Weeks opened: 4
• Theaters: 3,301 (+173)
• Per-theater average: $2,460
• Cume to date: $69.1 million
No. 4: Michael Clayton (Warner Bros, R)
• Gross: $7.1 million (-32%)
• Weeks opened: 3
• Theaters: 2,585 (+74)
• Per-theater average: $2,747
• Cume to date: $21.9 million
No. 5: Gone Baby Gone (Miramax, R)
• Gross: $6 million
• Weeks opened: NEW!
• Theaters: 1,713
• Per-theater average: $3,503
No. 6: The Comebacks (Fox Atomic, PG-13)
• Gross: $5,8 million
• Weeks opened: NEW!
• Theaters: 2,812
• Per-theater average: $2,080
No. 7: We Own the Night (Warner Bros., R)
• Gross: $5.5 million (-49%)
• Weeks opened: 2
• Theaters: 2,362 (unchanged)
• Per-theater average: $2,329
• Cume to date: $19.7 million
No. 8: Tim Burton's the Nightmare Before Christmas (Walt Disney, PG)
• Gross: $5.1 million
• Weeks opened: NEW!
• Theaters: 564
• Per-theater average: $9,122
No. 9: Rendition (New Line, R)
• Gross: $4.1 million
• Weeks opened: NEW!
• Theaters: 2,250
• Per-theater average: $1,856
No. 10: The Heartbreak Kid (Paramount, R)
• Gross: $3.9 million (-46%)
• Weeks opened: 3
• Theaters: 2,782 (-451)
• Per-theater average: $1,402
• Cume to date: $32.1 million
OTHER OPENINGS
Things We Lost in the Fire (DreamWorks, R)
• Gross: $1.6 million
• Weeks opened: NEW!
• Theaters: 1,142
• Per-theater average: $1,405
The Ten Commandments (Rocky Mountian Pictures, PG)
• Gross: $474,760
• Weeks opened: NEW!
• Theaters: 830
• Per-theater average: $572
Wristcutters: A Love Story (After Dark Films, R)
• Gross: $38,443
• Weeks opened: NEW!
• Theaters: 3
• Per-theater average: $12,814
Reservation Road (Focus Features, R)
• Gross: $36,821
• Weeks opened: NEW!
• Theaters: 14
• Per-theater average: $2,630
O Jerusalem (Rocky Mountain Pictures, PG)
• Gross: $17,192
• Weeks opened: NEW!
• Theaters: 11
• Per-theater average: $1,563
