Early Friday Box-Office: 'Green Lantern' is Flying Toward $58 Million

I am seeing Cars 2 on Saturday morning so I am going to have to rely on early Friday estimates for my report this week taken from Deadline.

We’ll begin at the top where Green Lantern is performing just as expected with an estimated $22 million on Friday, which includes $3.4 million from midnight showings. Should it hold strong over the Father’s Day weekend we could be looking at upwards of a $60 million debut, but I’m betting it ends on the softer side around $56-58 million.

Compared to this year’s two previous superhero releases that would put it at #2, behind Thor‘s $65.7 million opening weekend, but ahead of the $55.1 million X-Men: First Class took home two weekends ago. And with Green Lantern finally in theaters we now only have Captain America: The First Avenger left as the hunt for superhero supremacy 2011 carries on.

In second was the Jim Carrey “comedy” Mr. Popper’s Penguins, which took in an estimated $7 million on Friday. This is a rather impressive number if you ask me and shows Fox really managed to get the word out on this one. I also see no reason why it shouldn’t hold over pretty strong on Saturday and Sunday and may be able to cross the $20 million threshold.

Super 8 is managing a decent hold after opening at #1 last weekend with an estimated $5.8 million on Friday. Should the weekend play out as expected it could end around $19 million and about a 45% drop. I have a feeling it will be the next couple of weeks that will really show what kind of staying power this film truly has.

I feel the same way about X-Men: First Class, which is now in its third weekend and took in an estimated $3.3 million on Friday, which should translate to about $11 million for the weekend. This, unfortunately, is not a good sign as it signals a 54% drop, which would be its second week in a row dropping more than 50%. I thought this film may have longer legs than this, but it might not be able to withstand the growing amount of competition.

Lower down the list is Woody Allen’s Midnight In Paris, which can now be seen in 1,038 theaters across the country and finished in ninth place on Friday with an estimated $1.4 million, which should translate to about $5 million, bringing the film’s cumulative total over $21 million. This will put it a couple million shy of Allen’s two most recent successes Vicky Cristina Barcelona and Match Point, but still well shy of the $40 million brought in by Hannah and Her Sisters back in ’86.

Terrence Malick’s The Tree of Life brought in an estimated $300,000 on Friday from 114 screens and should end over $1 million for the weekend and finally we come to Fox Searchlight’s new release The Art of Getting By, which is showing in 610 theaters and managed only $275,000 on Friday and will end the weekend well below $1 million.

Just below I’ve included the early Friday estimates and will be back on Sunday morning with a complete wrap-up.