Universal’s “Despicable Me” certainly drove families in big numbers to theatres this weekend as the cute little minions generated a whopping $56.4 million and led a huge $200 million post-Fourth-of-July weekend. With great marketing (including tie-ins with IHOP), a perfect release date and the cutest creatures this side of Pluto, the PG-rated film starring Steve Carrel and Jason Segel had just as much appeal to adults as to kids and the results speak for themselves. Though 3-D is a question mark in the live action world, there is no question that families love this technology and kids in particular love 3-D films and the fun of putting on those goofy glasses. A Cinema Score of A will ensure continued strong box office and a $69 million budget a nice profit margin for these “Despicable” characters.
At number two with a solid 51% hold and another $31.7 million in the trust fund is Summit’s “The Twilight Saga: Eclipse.” In the wake of a $68.5 million first day and a massive six-day opening frame, the 51% drop indicates that “Eclipse” is getting great word-of-mouth and most certainly will surpass “New Moon’s” $296.6 million domestic gross. “Eclipse” after just 12 days of release is up to $235.4 million worth of teen crazed revenue at the box office.
Fox’s “Predators” certainly debuted well at number three with $24.8 million and proved that R-rated action films that are a hybrid of horror and sci-fi have huge appeal to audiences (particularly young males who made up the lion’s share of the audience. Sort of an “anti-Eclipse,” “Predators” with its R-rating and decidedly testosterone driven themes and images certainly paid off as guys were desperate to get an intense and very guy friendly summer movie-going experience.
Of course no weekend would be complete without Disney’s “Toy Story 3” which becomes the highest grossing Pixar movie ever as it earns $21 million in its fourth weekend against a mere 27% drop and a domestic gross of $340.2 million. This passes “Finding Nemo” and its domestic tally of $339.2 million and also becomes Disney’s second-highest grossing film ever behind only “Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest” ($423.3 million). A $400 million plus gross is certainly in the cards for this summer movie juggernaut.
Rounding out the Top Five is Fox’s “The Last Airbender” which surprised many last week with its much better-than-expected debut and now with a 57% second weekend drop and $16.6 million for the weekend it nearly crosses the $100 million mark. The PG-rated family adventure found disfavor with critics but certainly found an audience with families.
Lots of solid action in the indie world with the critical darling “The Kids Are All Right” from Focus Features scoring an insane and seat filling $70,282 per-theatre average in just seven theatres against an impressive $491,971 weekend box office take. Fox Searchlight’s “Cyrus” added 123 theatres and makes itself right at home in the top 10 with $1.3 million for the weekend and a running total of $3.4 million. Continued great buzz and critical raves are fueling this strong performance. The follow up to the immensely successful “The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo” from Music Box Films is “The Girl Who Played with Fire” which earned a $904,998 in just 108 theatres and wound up debuting in the 11th spot.
An incredibly solid weekend as the momentum established over the Fourth-of-July holiday continues as audiences seem to have finally gotten excited about going to the movie again. This sets up the perfect weekend for Disney’s “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice” and Warner Brothers’ highly-anticipated “Inception” to keep the good times rolling at the nation’s theatres.
