With a lot of negativity from the critical crowd, A Good Day to Die Hard and Safe Haven were running neck-and-neck at the Valentine’s Day weekend box-office, but John McClane found the edge after a slow start and was able to outlast the competition for the top spot.
A Good Day to Die Hard actually lost to Safe Haven on Valentine’s Day, but was able to regroup and finish the Friday to Sunday frame with $25 million while the latest Nicholas Sparks adaptation slipped to third with $21.4 million. Sliding into second as a result is last weekend’s #1 film, Identity Thief, with $23.4 million for an impressive 32% drop. It really is a weekend that defies critical opinion all the way around.
All three films mentioned above were, more-or-less, slammed by critics. Their combined 53% RottenTomatoes rating is still not enough for a “fresh” rating and yet, the audience has spoken. Both A Good Day to Die Hard and Safe Haven scored “B+” CinemaScore ratings from opening day moviegoers and Identity Thief received a “B“. What can you say? When you wonder why we get the films we do and why studios aren’t interested in taking risks, this is a good weekend to look back upon and meditate.
Looking over weekend predictions, Die Hard was still well below tracking and Laremy’s $34.1 million prediction. He proved closer on Safe Haven with a $24 million prediction against the film’s eventual $21.5m.
A peek at the reader predictions finds Dennis wasn’t afraid to go low on Die Hard and his $26 million prognostication comes out best and coltonhaynes22 seems almost clairvoyant when you consider his $21.3 million prediction for Safe Haven.
The other new film making waves in the top ten is the only new animated option for families this weekend. The Weinsteins’ Escape from Planet Earth wasn’t screened for critics and those that did go see it awarded it a 24% overall RottenTomatoes rating, but once again we have a film defying critical opinion.
Escape scored a solid $16.1 million at the box-office, defying tracking and Laremy’s $11.6 million prediction and readers weren’t able to come much closer, though Mario did break through the pack of low projections with a great $15.75m prediction that could end up almost spot-on once actuals are released.
Where things get troubling for me is when I see a franchise like Twilight do so well only to see a film like Beautiful Creatures utterly tank. The writing appeared to be on the wall for this adaptation of the best-selling series by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl, which WB was clearly hoping for a franchise, but after a dismal $7.5 million on opening weekend I think we can pretty much assume this one is dead in the water… Too bad too, because it’s actually not that bad a film and definitely the best of the new releases opening wide this weekend.
Laremy’s prediction of $18 million? Well, clearly that was off and looking over reader predictions it’s all over the board, yet the lowest anyone was willing to go was CJohn‘s prediction of $12.2 million.
Next weekend finds February coming to a close with Dark Skies and the Dwayne Johnson starrer, Snitch. I know Snitch is being screened, but it looks like Dimension is going to hope for the best when it comes to Dark Skies and pray thrillers remain attractive to their audience without much buzz behind them.
You want to place any early bets on next weekend’s #1? I have a feeling we’re going to see one of this weekend’s top three on top, but which one? I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments below.
