Box-Office Wrap-Up: Paramormal Activity 3 Opens to Record Breaking $54 Million
By
Brad Brevet
A couple of films crashed and burned this weekend while the film budgeted at a mere $5 million ended up becoming the highest grossing October opening ever. It surely faces a big drop next week, but at this rate I have to assume the wheels are spinning on how to make Paranormal Activity 4…
Laremy predicted the #1 movie correctly 3 Weeks In A Row
After $8 million in midnight ticket sales on Friday, Paranormal Activity 3 steam-rolled through the weekend becoming the best October opener of all-time, the best horror opening of all time and it’s the first film to cross the $50 million mark on opening weekend this year since Rise of the Planet of the Apes back at the beginning of August. While the film will probably suffer a large second week dip, much like the second release’s nearly 60% dip last year, it bested that second film by nearly $14 million in opening weekend dollars.
This is certainly a franchise Paramount should keep around. My only curiosity is to wonder what will happen if they make a Paranormal Activity 4? The fourth film was when the Saw franchise finally hit the wall, will the same happen here? And considering this film was made for only $5 million, does it matter how much another sequel would make if it costs that little to produce?
As far as predictions go, Laremy may have had it at #1, but he was $12 million off with his prediction and then he tried to give himself a $20 million cushion both ways. No dice. However, no one really had the guts to go above $50 million, though “ajaja” did say it would “open in 50 million range”. Not sure if I should count that so I will also mention Sensei White Lotus’ $47 million prediction as the closest actual prediction on the board.
Weekend: $54 million RottenTomatoes Score:71% Laremy’s rank: Laremy picked it to finish #1 and his prediction of $42 million was $12m off for a percentage error of 22.22%.
Real Steel continues to hang around and continues to do so with a small dip from week to week. This weekend it only dropped 30% as families have obviously taken to the manipulative robot boxing flick, which has now crossed the $67.2 million mark domestically. But I can’t help but believe this one is going to need to do a lot better to ever get that sequel made that they’ve been talking about since April. Oh wait, maybe just sell more toys and that will cover it.
Weekend: $11.3 million (-30.2% drop) / Cume: $67.2 million / RottenTomatoes:60% Laremy’s rank: Laremy picked it to finish #3 with $9.28 million, which is $2.02m off for a 17.88% error.
Footloose enjoyed a small drop as well. The film, which was budgeted at $24 million has now crossed the $30 million mark domestically, which means it’s going to need to do a lot more if it wants to become the next Step Up, a franchise that began with a film budgeted at $12 million that went on to make $65 million domestically and $114 million worldwide.
Weekend: $10.8 million (-30.3% drop) / Cume: $30.8 million / RottenTomatoes:71% Laremy’s rank: Laremy picked it to finish #4 with $7.23 million, which is $3.57m off for a 33.06% error.
Oh man, the airship has crashed and burned. Audiences were not convinced they needed to see a film about hot air balloon boats called The Three Musketeers as the film, which was budgeted at $90 million, brings home a paltry $8.8 million on opening weekend. Considering it was released in 3D it may be time to officially recognize the fact that’s one gimmick that is no longer helping bad films make good money.
When it comes to predictions, Laremy had it at #2 and ended up almost $5 million too high and only two of the readers predicted an opening below $10 million, the closest of which was John Debono’s at $9.6 million.
Weekend: $8.8 million / RottenTomatoes:29% Laremy’s rank: Laremy picked it to finish #2 with $13.5 million, which is $4.7m off for a 53.41% error.
George Clooney’s The Ides of March remains strong for a political film of its sort, budgeted at only $12.5 million after tax breaks it has scored over $29 million domestically. No, it’s not a lot of money, but when you make a film on a lean budget you don’t need to hit $100 million to be successful.
Weekend: $4.9 million (-31% drop) / Cume: $29.1 million / RottenTomatoes:83% Laremy’s rank: Laremy picked it to finish #6 with $4.76 million, which is $0.14m off for a 2.86% error.
Small drops and a rising cume tell me people want more films about animals with prosthetics.
Weekend: $4.2 million (-32.3% drop) / Cume: $64.3 million / RottenTomatoes:83% Laremy’s rank: Laremy picked it to finish #9 with $3.5 million, which is $0.7m off for a 16.67% error.
I’m not sure I’ll ever understand why this film failed to connect with a larger audience. What is it? Why didn’t more people go see this?
Weekend: $4 million (-25.9% drop) / Cume: $63.7 million / RottenTomatoes:95% Laremy’s rank: Laremy picked it to finish #8 with $3.64 million, which is $0.36m off for a 9% error.
I can understand why people skipped this one however, but that’s because I don’t find Rowan Atkinson’s Johnny English character to be all that funny. I skipped a screening of this one too, but that was more because my personal life forced me to miss it, but I wasn’t looking forward to it either.
I know a lot of our UK readers were thinking this one would score big bucks this week and that’s probably because it had already made $86 million overseas heading into its domestic debut. Considering the first film only made $28 million domestically back in 2003 and another $132 overseas, I think it’s pretty safe to say this film was made for the global appeal, not the American appeal.
Weekend: $3.8 million / RottenTomatoes:38% Laremy’s rank: Laremy picked it to finish #5 with $4.88 million, which is $1.08m off for a 28.42% error.
A 63% drop after a terrible opening weekend isn’t anything to cheer about. However, it was only made for $38 million so it’s not a huge loss.
Weekend: $3.1 million (-63.1% drop) / Cume: $14.1 million / RottenTomatoes:33% Laremy’s rank: Laremy picked it to finish #7 with $4.16 million, which is $1.06m off for a 34.19% error.
This film was never going to make a lot of money, but considering it’s a cancer dramedy made for only $8 million I think the studio will be happy enough with this return.
Weekend: $2.8 million (-33% drop) / Cume: $28.8 million / RottenTomatoes:93% Laremy’s rank: Laremy picked it to finish #10 with $2.92 million, which is $0.12m off for a 4.29% error.
Elsewhere, in limited release Fox Searchlight’s Martha Marcy May Marlene was released in only four theaters and managed a solid $138,000 opening, $34,500 per theater.
Next week sees the wide release of In Time and Puss in Boots after Sony decided to go with a limited release on Roland Emmerich’s Anonymous in hopes to build buzz. Do you see Puss in Boots continuing the big opening weekend trend and how high can Justin Timberlake’s In Time go?
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