Previously, the highest opening for a Disney animated film that wasn’t made by Pixar was the $48.7 million Tangled brought in back in 2010. Well, that record has fallen this weekend as Wreck-It Ralph brought in $49.1 million at the domestic box-office and I have to assume Disney is confident in that number as I wouldn’t think they would want media calling it a record to only have to detract the statement a day later.
Wreck-It Ralph got off to a great start on animated Oscar contenders this last week, it’s certainly beginning to heat up for the feature length cartoons.
On the prediction side of things, Laremy’s prediction of $39.6 million for Wreck-It Ralph was obviously low, but Will-E knew the number when he offered up $48.6 million. A few did go over $50 million as well, and who knows, maybe those will end up closer once actuals arrive.
In second is the impressive performance from Paramount’s Flight, which brought in a massive $25 million from only 1,884 theaters. That’s a $13,270 per theater result from a film with a budget of only $31 million. I’m not sure if the credit should go to the marketing campaign, the reviews or the magnetism of Denzel Washington, but I have to assume it’s a mixture of all three that brought on this success. On top of that, the film earned an “A-” Cinemascore so count on good buzz and strong results over the next few weekends.
Laremy’s $10.8 million prediction was obviously very low, but I think it was hard to tell what was going to happen with Flight as a drama about an alcoholic doesn’t necessarily scream “Come watch me!” to general audiences. However, Paramount put together some nice marketing material and the reviews were very good and people obviously turned out. On the reader side of things I have to give a big shout-out to Dennis Brian for a $25.5 million prediction. That is nice work.
Speaking of strong results, Argo held off The Man with the Iron Fists and holds on for a third place finish, dropping only 15% and bringing in $10.2 million bringing the film’s cumulative total to $75.8 million.
As for The Man with the Iron Fists, the result wasn’t too bad. Playing in only 1,868 theaters this weekend the film managed $8.2 million, though I expect it to drop pretty hard over the coming weeks as the “C+” Cinemascore doesn’t bode well for positive buzz. The film, however, was made on only a $15 million budget and I would expect it to have some value overseas and on home video so this is hardly a bad investment for Universal.
Again, Laremy was under on his prediction with this one as we saw a very good box-office weekend these past three days, and again Dennis Brian scores the winning reader prediction with $8.9 million. That man is on a role ladies and gentlemen.
Otherwise, I don’t see anything else that gets me too excited this weekend, though it is nice to see that it’s up 19% from last year. That’s good news and the big numbers should definitely continue next weekend once Skyfall hits theaters and Lincoln begins its limited release before going wide the following weekend.
This weekend’s top ten estimates are directly below with theater counts, budgetary numbers, RottenTomatoes results and more.
