The biggest debut of the weekend went to the Denzel Washington sci-fi action film "The Book of Eli", which debuted on 3,111 screens for an estimated cume of $31.6 million. On Friday, the Hughes Brothers-directed tale actually took the top spot from "Avatar" with an opening day gross of $11.7 million ("Avatar" made $10.4 million on Friday), but relinquished the spot on Saturday as Cameron's PG-13 fantasy surged ahead in ticket sales. "Eli" saw its gross rise only by roughly $1 million on Saturday, which usually indicates mixed word-of-mouth from viewers and a possibly rough road ahead at the box office. Still, "Eli"s debut is impressive, especially in light of its R-rating and grim apocalyptic tone.
Speaking of James Cameron's blockbuster, the movie held tight and added another $41.6 million to its take to edge closer to the half-billion dollar mark ($492 million) after only one month of release (it should breeze by that milestone by Monday or Tuesday of this week). With drops of only 20-30% each weekend, the film will easily pass "The Dark Knight"s $533 million domestic take to become the second-highest grossing film of all time (pre-inflation adjustment) and is looking more and more likely to overtake "Titanic"s $600 million lifetime gross when all is said and done.
After spending a month in limited release in New York and Los Angeles, where the film struggled to make half a million bucks, Peter Jackson's "The Lovely Bones" finally expanded to 2,563 screens for an estimated three-day take of $17 million. The critically-reviled adaptation of Alice Siebold's novel had its marketing campaign drastically revised over the past month or so by distributor Paramount, focusing more on teenage girls than adults (translation: the demographic that doesn't read reviews).
The revised ad campaign might have worked for opening weekend, but the real test will come over the next few weeks to see if the tween set's reaction winds up being more "OMG!" than "WTF?" (which was my reaction to the film). One thing is for certain: with its $100 million price tag, it will take divine intervention for "Lovely Bones" to be a profitable film.
The third opener of the weekend was the Jackie Chan family comedy "The Spy Next Door" arrived DOA with an estimated $9.7 million from 2,924 screens. The film was never expected to be big, but it was expected to do better since it is a holiday weekend. Expect this film to move next door to other forgettable family flicks at your local Blockbuster in a few months.
Apparently, families were still catching up with the "Alvin and the Chipmunks" sequel to bother with the Jackie Chan opus, depositing another $11.5 million into the rodent's coffers for a new estimated cume of $193 million. Fellow Christmas week release "Sherlock Holmes" pulled in another $9.8 million for a new to-date total of $180 million.
The remainder of the top ten were holdovers from the Christmas season as well as the first two weeks of January. "It's Complicated" continued to pull in the adult crowd for another $7.6 million and a new take of approximately $88 million. After debuting softly last weekend, "Leap Year" held on for another weekend with a $5.8 million estimated take and a $17 million to-date gross. Watch for Amy Adams' romantic comedy to finish near $30 million.
While the Baltimore Ravens got booted out of the playoffs Saturday night, the movie about one of their offensive tacklers, Michael Oher, was far from being down and out. The resilient "The Blind Side" pulled in another $5.6 million in sales this weekend, bringing its total up to the $226 million mark. In tenth spot was another adult-oriented film, "Up in the Air" also with an estimated $5.5 million take to bring its cume to $63 million.
Next weekend, the horror entry "Legion", the Harrison Ford medical drama "Extraordinary Measures" and the Dwayne Johnson comedy "The Tooth Fairy" all debut.
In other words, it looks like another weekend at number one for "Avatar".
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