Seconds, anyone? Eating up $24.6 million worth of tickets, Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs defied box office gravity by falling a minuscule 19 percent to win the top spot yet again. The CG family film capitalized on good buzz and a lack of kid-friendly fare in theaters to best three new wide releases, raising its total gross to $60 million. In a distant second place, Surrogates, starring Bruce Willis as an FBI agent in a futuristic world, opened to $15 million. That’s a middling bow for a headliner like Willis, but the Die Hard star can hardly be blamed: His image was totally absent from much of the movie’s marketing, including an odd poster campaign that featured human-robot hybrids in seductive poses.
At number three with $10 million, the much-hyped Fame remake failed to light up the sky like a flame, as it were. With no recognizable names among its youthful stars (the supporting cast features vets like Megan Mullally and Kelsey Grammer), the musical relied almost entirely on nostalgia for the 1980 original to fill seats. The weekend’s other new release, the outer space thriller Pandorum, failed to launch, earning just $4.4 million from 2,506 theaters for a decidedly earthbound per-screen average of $1,758.
But there was plenty of good news among holdovers this week on top of Meatballs‘ repeat victory. Raking in $6.9 million, Matt Damon’s off-kilter comedy The Informant! fell just 34 percent in its second weekend, a sure sign of good word of mouth for the Steven Soderbergh-directed pic. Meanwhile, Tyler Perry’s I Can Do Bad All By Myself stayed put for a third weekend in the top five with $4.8 million.
Further down the chart, a pack of limited-release pics tested the waters with mixed results. There were a few clear winners: Michael Moore’s Capitalism: A Love Story generated a whopping $240,000 from just four theaters for $60,000 per-screen average—the year’s best so far. The Audrey Tautou period biopic Coco Before Chanel grossed $177,000 at 5 location for a $35,400 average, and The Office star John Krasinski pulled in $20,600 at a single screen with his directorial debut, Brief Interviews with Hideous Men. Meanwhile, slower starts were had by the Clive Owen drama The Boys Are Back ($51,000 from six screens) and I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell, featuring macho blogger and best-selling author Tucker Max, which earned a so-so $369,000 from 120 theaters.
More box office news:
Box Office Report: ‘Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs’ wins Friday with $5.6 million
Box Office Preview: ‘Surrogates’ to challenge ‘Cloudy’ for top spot; ‘Fame’ looking at number three
Box Office: ‘Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs’ soars; ‘Jennifer’s Body’ sinks
Comments (1-15) of 18 Add your comment
john krasinski’s movie was amazing!
This is just F’n sad. Only in this country do we amass a fortune towards a worthy cause such as crap at the movies when that same money could be going to help thousands in need. Sometimes after reading stories like this one I don’tneed to wonder why other countries dislike us so much
It’s the rule of supply and demand. I understand your disappointment but it’s hardly like the USA is the only country who spends a fortune at the cinema.
If you are so appalled at the amount of money we as a country spend. Why is it that you are reading an ENTERTAINMENT web site. You must admit that is some small way you contribute to the entertainment industry.
What might be crap to you isn’t the same to others
Make a movie a donate your profits Tim.
Other countries dislike us because of the movies we watch, you moron. They dislike us because we bomb and invade them.
Good news to hear, but what about results for Paranormal Activity?! It was in limited release last weekend, but such an amazing (and scary) movie! A quick review for anybody interested (LIGHT SPOILERS, nothing you probably wouldn’t get from a promo), this movie is pretty much The Blair Witch Project, just in a house instead of the woods, and a demon instead of a witch. So if you liked TBWP, you’ll probably like this movie. If you hated TBWP, don’t bother seeing this one.
It made $9.50 for a 112th place finish.
They’re only showing midnight showings, on Friday and Saturday, in State College. Sold out and there were lines forming an hour before it started.
I saw CLOUDY today in fact; delightful movie. It is pretty sad when CGI films like CLOUDY, 9, and Pixar’s classics are so much better than 99% of the crap made by living, breathing, overpaid humans in Hollyweird.
The problem isn’t that Hollywood makes crap. It’s that people pay to see it. If people stopped going to see crap the studios would stop making it. You want to be annoyed about the lack of quality? Remind yourself there are people who think movies you like are crap, too.
Steve: I AM DYING TO SEE PARANORMAL ACTIVITY!!! Unfortunately it is not playing in my city, Hopefully it will float my way soon. I am so sick of slasher/torture porn horror films; how many variations of a semi-nude coed getting her throat slashed can be scary anyways?! PARANORMAL ACTIVITY sounds like a return to true terror and scares.
Definitely agreed! Go to the website and demand it to play near you, I’d be very surprised if it doesn’t expand before Halloween. The only reason we got it at State College is because the crew from the other Ghost Hunters show (what is it, Paranormal Investigators?) were formed at Penn State. And yea, it really hits you on a deeper level. One thing though: there’s no soundtrack, so if you get anyone that feels like talking in the theatre, you can hear EVERYTHING. Thank you high school girls sitting behind me >:O
I think that Fame’s $10 million box office result is decent. It’s kind of risky to have it compete against Cloudy. Doing a remake is a lot more difficult than it looks.
Hey Tim Turks, grab your soapbox and beat it. If you really think other countries dislike us for our movie choices you need to lay off eating the lead paint chips. You sound dopey as all get out.
“That’s a middling bow for a headliner like Willis, but the Die Hard star can hardly be blamed: His image was totally absent from much of the movie’s marketing…”
Every trailer and commercial I saw had Willis all over them. I didn’t see the posters, but everything I did see about the movie featured Willis.
Nice to see entertaining family fare trump uninspired offerings like Surrogates…. See unique multi-generation reviews of these current releases on YouTube’s “Gab and Dad” channel: youtube.com/gabndad
Glad not only “Meatballs” stood up against Megan Fox, but stood up against the naysayers!