Nothing like a good disaster movie to bring in a lot of coin at the box office. At least that was the case this weekend with Roland Emmerich’s end-of-the world tale 2012 which took in an estimated $65 million stateside and an additional $160 million overseas. The John Cusack thriller brought in more than its $200 million budget in its opening weekend, a huge win for Sony Pictures. Add in the spectacular limited release reign of Precious: Based on the Novel Push by Sapphire and the weekend was a solid one even if it couldn’t surpass last year at this time when Sony’s Quantum of Solace was top dog on the list.
In second place was Disney’s A Christmas Carol, which despite opening softly last weekend, held up well in its second weekend in theaters, dropping only 26%. The Robert Zemeckis, CG-animated film grossed $22.3 million, with 14% of its tally coming from IMAX’s 182 runs. Its total cume now stands at $63 million. Third place belonged to the George Clooney-starrer The Men Who Stare At Goats. Dropping an estimated 51% from last weekend, the film grossed an additional $6.2 million, putting its ten-day cume at $23 million.
Fourth place was Lionsgate’s Precious, which continues to have one of the most astounding limited-release runs in box office history. Adding 156 theaters to its teeny opening weekend run, the Lee Daniels-directed film earned $6 million this weekend, for an incredible per-screen average of $35,000. The movie has earned close to $9 million in only two weeks in release.
Slot number five belonged to Michael Jackson’s This is It, which lost a steep 61% at $5.1 million. The concert film/documentary has now earned $67 million in its three weeks in release and is set to stay in theaters through Thanksgiving weekend. The only other wide release to open this weekend was Focus Features’ British import Pirate Radio, which grossed outside of the top ten with only $2.8 million. Despite success overseas, the Philip Seymour Hoffman comedy didn’t travel well stateside. That’s it for the weekend box-office scoop. Come back next week when The Twilight Saga: New Moon is sure to have a record-breaking opening.
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They need to give Precious a wide release so I can see it!
I believe the wide release is this coming Friday.
“It’s total cume”… should be “its.”
Wow. Bored much?
Come on. It’s not too much to ask that a national publication like EW know the difference between “its” and “it’s.”
Anyway, the success of 2012 has proven to me that most Americans are sheep who will watch any stupid crap as long as it’s advertised enough. Here’s hoping this movie declines fast.
Wow, using correct spelling and grammar – how boring.
Get a hobby.
Good catch.
What are you guys, retired school teachers or something??? Get a life.
Totally agree. Americans are sheep. Watch the totally lame gay-vampire-teen-angst ‘Moon’ break records.
You have to be a retired school teacher to be literate? Who knew?!
I agree, good catch on the grammer they shoold lurn to spell
I tend to give the critics/writers here a break. They are under such tight deadlines and gosh knows that no one will pay for a proofreader anymore. Plus Spellcheck programs will not pick up inconsistencies like it’s versus its. Finally, she used the correct “its” two lines later – give her a break.
Hollywood Insider used the possessive “its” correctly. “It’s” is an abbreviation of “it is” and it would have been incorrect.
$225 million worldwide for 2012?? MPAA: “Oh no, downloads are hurting our boxoffice!!”
2012 was a little overrated, sucks for this is it, and a christmas carol was kinda creepy
2012 opening weekend was in my opinion very impressive. 225 million for the first weekend worldwide can eventually translate to 600 million by the end of its run worldwide, which should be enough to profit from.
And EW. Seriously. Twilight Saga: New Moon will not break any major records; not opening weekend, single day, not even top november weekend, because Twilight does not have the strong following that Harry Potter has, and the latter made 102 million in its opening weekend. Twilight should be happy with 90 million. Please don’t spend three months going Ga-ga for this film. The first one didn’t even break 200 million. So enough with the praise. It’s no Harry POtter
I hate to burst your bubble but new moon has out sold harry potter on mid-night sales. In the theater I work at, all 9 theaters are sold out.
Its not possible to know if New Moon will break harry’s record if it hasnt come out yet.
I also have to disagree with you, Bradd Bradd. I think that New Moon will see a record opening, primarily due to the fact that it has an audience that feels like it must see it on opening weekend (tweens, teens, horror fans). Sure, Potter had some of this same audience but it had a lot of families willing to wait. The gross of Twilight isn’t relevant because Twilight has garnered even a greater audience through DVD rentals. (Ex: first Austin Powers grossed 60 mil. 2nd one grossed over 200 mil.) I think that your desire for the film to not due well is making you look like a fool in your prediction. I’m not even a Twilight, but I’m not stupid enough to think that New Moon won’t challenge some November records.
“Precious” is a good movie. But Lee Daniel’s lack of directorial skill is apparent throughout the film. The subject matter is tough, but cutting the intense scenes with her fantasy sequences take away from their impact. Also, there were odd errors. For 1987, some of the music was not of the era. It looked like she lived in an apartment with an upstairs, but she was shown walking into a regular building. And a lot of the locations were in Washington Heights, not Harlem. But aside from that, it was a good movie. But the acting elevates it from being a “Lifetime” movie. With a better director, this movie could have had an even deeper emotional impact.
Agree with every point.
I agree. I found the lack of detail with respect to the ’80s setting very distracting. I thought it looked and felt like it was set present day, not in 1987.
the fantasy sequnces showed you how she got thru those terrible moments. many times victims of molestation state “going outside of my body” in order to get thru the abuse. The moment we saw in the movie were enought to make me sick i don’t think showing them any longer would have help. it would have made it gross and put even more focus on the bad rather than the little bit of good in the movie. it also keeps the movie in line with the book.
please excuse the typos. i hate when i do that.
If it weren’t for those fantasy scenes coming when they did I would have walked out of the movie theatre 30 mins in. We got to escape the way Precious escaped. It was a clever way of releasing the tension of the moment.
Good job, Nicole. Looks like you nailed 2012’s box office prediction.
Like who cares how to spell on this damn website. This aint college. they can write however they want people. Anyway 2012 was AWESOME. I went to watch it at 11:25pm and didnt even know it was 2:15 am when it was over. It was that good of a movie. The idiot like Julie E dont need to watch movies like these. Go watch ‘the men who stared at sheep’ or whatever the hell its called freakin IDIOT woman.
Jon you ignorant slut!
Precious is as good an indie as I’ve ever seen. The performance of the young girl will take your breath away.
Her performance should take Big Momma Winfrey’s breath away forever!
Oh yeah and congrat to Nicole on her prediction. If you spelled whatever incorrectly its OK Nicole…Julie E was probably my fat ugly English teacher I had in high school LOL
Liar! Its clear you did not go to high school…
Actually i am college educated and only three classes left of getting my MBA. I also own my own business too and i still cant spell good…or speak English that well LOL….it goes to prove you dont have to know how to spell good or speak enlish good to be successful
Somewhere along the line, our educational system failed you. Not only are your grammar and spelling atrocious, but your thought processes seem to be stuck at a third grade level. Enjoy that online degree.
Sour grapes much? Jon is right, it is possible to be successful WITHOUT having a hoity toity degree. Others might feel like they need a little piece of paper to validate their lives while others recognize what works best for them and go after their dreams – some fail, some make it. While you might have excelled at school, your personal and social skills leave much to be desired and it is clear, at least to me, that you are the type of person I would instantly reject as a friend or even just an acquaintance… enjoy your pathetic, well educated, hoity toity life.
No, sour grapes are not involved. Why would they be? Why does everyone think that when someone criticizes that they are jealous? It’s incredibly juvenile. And no need to worry about my social skills. I have plenty of friends, thank you very much, from varying educational backgrounds. All of them, however, are capable of expressing themselves clearly and in proper English.
2012 killed precious because this white racist socity didn’t release it world wide like 2012 was because
“Precious” has only been in limited release in the US. It’s a typcial strategy with an independent movie to open in NY and LA, then in select cities before going wide. It builds up interest, as it has obviously done with “Precious”. As for opening internationally, I don’t know what sort of distribution deal the movie has, if any, but to blame it on racism shows that you really haven’t bothered to learn anythng about the release of the movie. It did show at the Toronto Film Festival, so it has had exposure outside of the US.
You may have misread. “2012 kills” comma “Precious amazes”.
Kim why would you blame the reason it wasnt released worldwide is because of rascism? Why do we have to put race into all this? Precious is like a basic drama movie made in America and i dont think people in other country care about our dramas. the world wants to see American films that is about blowing up stuff. I used to live in other countries and thats all they want to see. Geez Kim you sound just as dumb as Julie E is right now.
i agree with you jon, there is always someone that has to put out the race card in everything, that is why things are so screwed up.
I never thought of it as a racism, I agree with you people like to see things blow up. If you look at these years number one movie it tells you the same thing that we like the blow them up stuff.
It is getting a worldwide release but it will be done slowly as is the case with most independent movies. The problem is that large studios don’t like to make movies about people of color so they tend to fall in the independent category. Even Tyler Perry’s awful, but popular, movies are released abroad months after they are released in the US/Canada because he produces and distributes them independently (he had a questionable encounter with a studio exec when he first started out).
@jon and you sound stupider and stupider.. “in other COUNTRIES” not “in other COUNTRY”.. god, your mother must be proud