Looks like the gods don’t like to be damned. Clash of the Titans, which opened with $61 million last weekend, couldn’t muster a second offensive as its box-office receipts fell by 56% percent. You don’t need to be wearing 3-D glasses to see that the word-of-mouth has not been good for this Louis Leterrier remake. On the bright side, the film’s percentage loss is 4% less than Leterrier’s Incredible Hulk from a few years ago.
Early estimations that Date Night was tops at the box office turned out to be incorrect. Clash of the Titans managed to stave off the action-comedy to maintain atop the box office list.
Still, Date Night opened to solid returns with $25.5 million ($1.6 million less than originally anticipated). The FOX comedy with NBC stars (Steve Carell and Tina Fey) fared much better than the March release The Bounty Hunter, with Jennifer Aniston and Gerard Butler, which also mashes action and comedy. That movie opened to $20.7 million. A bad pairing and worst script were major reasons why the comedy wasn’t a bigger success. Luckily for Date Night, the pairing of Carell and Fey works, though the script makes you wish Fey had written it herself. Good reviews and word-of-mouth reception will likely keep the comedy in the top five before the start of the summer movie season.
As for Titans, its worldwide gross of $155 million is $30 million more than the reported production budget. Now it needs to work on marketing costs. Considering the cineplex is devoid of action-heavy spectacles, the movie is almost given a pass despite its less-than-stellar reception. Expect that worldwide gross to move up a few notches once it opens in some of the larger territories where movies of Titans ilk tend to do very well.
Probably the best story in the current top ten is the continued success of How to Train Your Dragon. Last week it only dropped 33.7%. This week the decline was only 12%. It’s the best-reviewed film of the year with an impressive 98% rating at Rotten Tomatoes (thankfully, this one managed to escape Armond White’s gaze). This animated hit from DreamWorks made another $25 million, notching its domestic total to $134 million. Combined with its haul overseas it has amassed $256 million. On the horizon, the movie’s only other kid-oriented competition is Furry Vengeance (April 30th) with Brendan Fraser and talking animals. Yeah, I don’t think the film has anything to worry about.
Other notes in the top ten: Box office receipts fell 62% in the second week of release for Tyler Perry’s Why Did I Get Married Too?. Still, it’s already recouped its budget. I’m sure the suits at Lionsgate are pleased and wishes Perry had another film ready for a late 2010 release. Alice in Wonderland remains a favorite among families in its sixth week of release. With its $5.6 million take the Disney hit has accumulated $319 million domestically, making it the biggest film of 2010 at the box office. (The arrival of Iron Man 2 on May 7th will quickly toast the Mad Hatter and the other creatures of Wonderland.) Of the films currently in the top ten, only three have made at least double their reported production budget (Tyler Perry, The Last Song, and Diary of a Wimpy Kid).
It seems that the Christian drama Letters to God experienced some “growing pains” as it opened on 897 screens to $1.1 million. Not a bad number, but it could have really used the star power of Kirk Cameron. Because only he and Willie Aames as Bibleman have the much-needed clout when it comes to ’80s sitcom stars who can get churchgoers out of their pews and to the cinema on a Sunday morning.
After an impressive seven-week run, Shutter Island was bumped from the top ten and finished in eleventh place.
For films opening in limited release, Benjamin Bratt’s La Mission totaled $49,000 on 15 screens. The documentary about The Doors, When You’re Strange, played at eight venues and grossed a respectable $65,371. Its per screen average of $8,171 is better than all of the films listed in the top ten, but not better than two other limited releases. The neo-noirish The Square made $16,500 on two screens and the German drama Everyone Else made $11,400 at a single location in Manhattan, thus giving it the highest per screen average of the weekend.
1. Date Night – $27.1 million ($27.1 mil.)
2. Clash of the Titans – $26.9 million ($110 mil.)
3. How to Train Your Dragon – $25.4 million ($134 mil.)
4. Why Did I Get Married Too? – $11 million ($48.5 mil.)
5. The Last Song – $10 million ($42.4 mil.)
6. Alice in Wonderland – $5.6 million ($319 mil.)
7. Hot Tub Time Machine – $5.4 million ($37 mil.)
8. The Bounty Hunter – $4.3 million ($56 mil.)
9. Diary of a Wimpy Kid – $4.1 million ($53.8 mil.)
10. Letters to God – $1.1 million ($1.1. mil.)
Note: Original Top 10 Rankings estimates
