| Film |
Weekend |
Per Screen |
Film Total |
|
| 1 |
Enchanted | $35,332,000 | $9,472 | $50,048,000 |
| 2 |
This Christmas | $18,600,000 | $10,010 | $27,100,000 |
| 3 |
Beowulf | $16,240,000 (-41.0%) | $5,046 | $56,361,000 |
| 4 |
Hitman | $13,035,000 | $5,303 | $21,000,000 |
| 5 |
Bee Movie | $12,010,000 (-14.3%) | $3,424 | $112,069,000 |
| 6 |
Fred Claus | $10,735,000 (-9.9%) | $2,979 | $53,070,000 |
| 7 |
August Rush | $9,430,000 | $4,082 | $13,330,000 |
| 8 |
American Gangster | $9,207,000 (-28.5%) | $3,289 | $115,774,000 |
| 9 |
The Mist | $9,062,000 | $3,739 | $13,012,000 |
| 10 |
No Country for Old Men | $8,112,000 (+163.7%) | $9,432 | $16,640,000 |
“Orson Welles here. This weekend Enchanted put a spell over audiences and bewitched its way into the hearts… I can’t say this. This is garbage. If you can find someone who can make this work, I’ll blow them.”
Orson! That’s what everyone’s going to say. Writing about box office involves horrible puns. That number is pretty great for a high concept film starring Amy Adams. The number isn’t as high as I predicted, but everyone’s got to be happy and getting over nine digits is pretty much guaranteed.
“Orson Welles here. Christmas came Thanksgiving weekend, as This Christmas made nearly 30 Million, which is a pretty jolly number. Good Christ, this is terrible. Did someone write this?”
Yes, yes they did, and yes they will. For a low budg film, this is a rather good number. If it’s like a Tyler Perry film, it should be something of a smash and grab, but this has a reported budget of $13 million, so the modestly budgeted black family movie has an audience that can be automatically remunerative.
“Remunerative. Why can’t they give me words like remunerative? You know what sentence is fun to say?” Is that what this is?” You can say that ten different ways. Sometimes I’d warm up just saying that over and over, trying to find a different tonality… Beowulf ate up it’s competition… now you’re just baiting me.”
Beowulf did okay, but look at the hit it took. Nine digits is guaranteed, but those IMAX and 3-D screen hopefully will help out more than I thought they would need to. This was a very expensive film that was well advertised and isn’t going to perform as well as Enchanted.
“Orson Welles here, Hitman targeted its audience to score a bullseye. I can’t express how much contempt I have for what I’m saying. You want more bad puns? Bee Movie buzzed its way to fifth place to hit the honey-pot. It’s seems no one was in an August Rush… August Rush? No one got misty for The Mist.. that’s it, I’m done.”
Fair enough. Hitman did all right, for what it is, it’s also a smash and grab. August Rush was DOA, and so, sadly was The Mist, though a low production budget will surely make it profitable. The Weinstein company… Yeah. Perhaps it’s because they spent most of their money on TV spots, but couldn’t drum up much else. No Country expanded to 860 screens and did great business (almost a better per screen than Enchanted), so it should continue its streak and get to over $30, or become the sleeper art-house hit of the year and start cracking higher. Next weekend brings one wide release. We shall see.
We shall see.