Film Weekend Per Screen Total
1 The Hangover $33,415,000 (-25.7%) $9,960 $105,389,000
2 Up $30,515,000 (-30.9%) $7,853 $187,179,000
3 The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3 $25,000,000 $8,133 $25,000,000
4 Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian $9,600,000 (-34.4%) $2,853 $143,447,000
5 Land of the Lost $9,153,000 (-51.4%) $2,590 $34,980,000
6 Imagine That $5,700,000 $1,895 $5,700,000
7 Star Trek $5,600,000 (-32.6%) $2,123 $232,028,000
8 Terminator Salvation $4,695,000 (-43.1%) $1,772 $113,831,000
9 Angels & Demons $4,200,000 (-35.9%) $1,724 $123,300,000
10 Drag Me to Hell $3,864,000 (-45.1%) $1,700 $35,146,000

This just in: Though obviously the premise has been turned into a hit film, Alcohol – whilst occasionally causing black outs – should not become a cultural excuse for forgetting what you did the night before.

If Eddie Murphy has a bed, which I’m sure he does, he’s shit in it. Murphy saw his comic career start to wane in straight projects, and now he’s chased kids films until that ran out. Though Murphy may not have taken the direct hit for Meet Dave (which was terrible),  his kids efforts have had diminishing returns, with Imagine That looking to be the lowest ebb. Meet Dave neared $12 Million, and this might do a bit better, and have a stronger cushion in terms of TV sales, it’s still pretty disastrous. Then again, I don’t feel like Paramount treated it with a lot of faith, and they’ve got Transformers coming down the pike pretty quick (though that’s a Dreamworks title). Eddie might have another Klumps film in him though those films are something of a target of mockery now if Tropic Thunder is to be believed, but I don’t doubt his ability for reinvention, and him doing Richard Pryor should still get asses in seats. When that comes out I want to do a triple feature of it, Harlem Nights and Jo Jo Dancer, Your Life is Calling.  Did you know that Pryor showed Jo Jo to Pauline Kael for notes? I like thinking that they were friendly. Eddie’s also got Beverly Hills Cop IV on the plate. I bet there’s no four in the title if it happens. Like a lot of these new fangled sequels. Maybe it will be called The Beverly Hills Cop.

The Hangover is going to get to $200. And next week is all about The Proposal, so it’s possible if the film only takes a light tumble it could be the #1 picture three weeks in a row in the middle of the summer. It is going to outperform all but Star Trek and Up of the May giants. And it’s going to outperform the Apatow pictures. Perhaps this will see a rise in outrageous comedies, but there’s a definite right place, right time, right film about this picture. Even if you make six to eight of these films for what you could a film like Terminator, from a studio’s perspective, the one franchise picture is the safer bet, especially when most comedies don’t translate. Also of note: Ferrell tanked with Land of the Lost, and Seth Rogen hasn’t been showing any muscle, it’ll be interesting to see how Funny People does (it still has the Sandler cushion), because audiences may have had enough of the Apatow crew recently.

Up is playing stronger than Wall*E or Cars, which means that $250 or more is assured. From the outset, a film about an old man with a floating house outperforming a film about robots sounds crazy, but here is where quality and audience interest comes in to play. And as much as people love that first act of Wall*E, it probably is the emotionality of the first ten minutes of Up that is really bringing them in and back. Like last year, we’re seeing a lot of the big summer movies that look to be good playing well with audiences. Though Devin wrote an advocate about how the sexuality in Wall*E was on the disturbing side of things, it could be the anthropomorphising in general that kept the film from breaking out (instead of being a solid hit, which it was).

The Taking of the Pelham 1 2 3 performed about as expected. There’s a good news bad news to this. The film will likely round out with a $70-80 grand total, though the film cost more than that – but… strike pictures should be graded on a curve, and it’s possible that the international numbers will be healthy. It’s still not going to be a win, but for a film that was part of the greenlight fever of strike time, and for a film that seems slightly out of date (everyone involved could have made this film five, ten  or really even fifteen years ago) it’s a middle grounder. Perhaps these are good numbers for 1998, if we’re to look at it that way. Basically, it’s not a bomb, so eventual profiting is likely.

Night at the Museum is still playing, and may get close to $180 or so. There’s too much coming to weather more than that. It’s not great, but it’s no Land of the Lost. Lost took a 50% dive, and it’s going to keep dropping hotly. Cult status awaits.

Trek will get to $250, but Transformers will be the end of it, so there’s that. Salvation is done, so is Angels and Demons, but where the latter has had a strong international showing, Terminator (which may not be in all markets yet) is not outpacing domestic. Warners has their Hangover to crow about though (international is likely going to be weak on that one, though), and Harry Potter should make it a good summer for them. Drag Me to Hell is almost out of the top ten, so if you haven’t seen it, get on it. A little over $40 is sad, but as a small-scale genre effort, that’s not the worst thing. Will there be an unrated DVD? That doesn’t seem to be the movie Raimi made, but there might be some pressure to have an “unrated cut.” I’m making this up, I have no knowledge of this at all, but I wonder if Sam Raimi the producer is having an internal discussion with Raimi the director. Then again, the “unrated” gimmick may not be the selling point it once was. The new Friday the 13th has one, so who’s to say?

Next week is going to be interesting.