Sony’s Hotel Transylvania needed to make more than $30.3 million to surpass Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs and become Sony Animation’s highest opener to date. With $43 million in its first three days, it accomplished that feat, but that’s just a personal record. Those kinds of records are fun for office parties and water cooler banter, but I’m pretty sure there’s another, bigger record they’ll be bragging about all over the studio lot.
Hotel Transylvania topped Sweet Home Alabama‘s ten-years-old, $35.6 million opening weekend to become September’s highest opener ever. That is, unless you adjust for inflation, but water cooler talk doesn’t get that too complex when it comes to the mathematics. I’m sure they know letter grades though, and the film earned an “A-” CinemaScore from audiences, which means this one may be around for a while.
How much confidence did RopeofSilicon readers have in Hotel Transylvania? Compared to its result, not a lot. Looking over predictions from Thursday, Laremy finally gets back in the winning column predicting the #1 film correctly for the first time in almost a month, but his $28.4 million prediction was low and the highest any of the readers were willing to go was athar‘s $33 million. Looks like Adam Sandler is back in the winning column, even if it is just his voice.
In second, the box-office chatter began last night when everyone and their mother received the press release proclaiming how great Rian Johnson‘s Looper was doing in China, bringing in an estimated $23-25 million, which marks the first time an international film has finished number one in China. For anyone that’s seen Looper you already know how many companies were involved in producing it with all the logos that appear before the opening credits even begin, which means a lot of people were looking to see how good it would do. Considering that $30 million budget, I’d say there are a lot of smiling faces this morning.
With an estimated $21.2 million Looper is doing quite well here at home as well. My first instinct was to wonder if it could perform better than Source Code, which only opened just below $15 million last year, but a strong and savvy marketing team got people interested, but the CinemaScore did only result in a “B”. Not sure how that will translate to future domestics box-office.
As for Looper predictions, Laremy was close with a $22.4 million prediction, but big kudos to jess E. and a $21 million pick. That’s close.
Next in line when it comes to new releases is Universal’s wild success with the limited release of Pitch Perfect, which was ushered into a mere 335 theaters and brought home $5.2 million for a $15,560 per theater average. Laremy didn’t have it cracking the top ten and only two RopeofSilicon readers even bothered to predict its end result so I guess I’ll give Jack the kudos for his $3 million prediction. Nice job?
That’s not the end of the per theater average good news, Summit’s excellent The Perks of Being a Wallflower is still only playing in limited theaters (102 to be exact) and brought in $1.1 million this weekend for an $11,150 per theater average. When can you see it? Well, if it’s not in your hometown yet, click here to see when it will be.
The other new wide release this weekend was Fox and Walden’s teaming, Won’t Back Down. With all the success being discussed to this point you may want to avert your eyes if you don’t want to hear bad news, because this one bombed. Opening in 2,515 theaters, Won’t Back Down tallied a mere $2.7 million and the only thing Fox and Co. can hang their hat on is that those that went seemed to like it, giving it an “A-” CinemaScore. This is one score, however, that I don’t think will mean bigger business in the future. It’s one thing for an audience to like a film, it’s another to get people to actually want to see it.
In other news, Lionsgate’s Dredd 3D suffered a 64% drop, bringing in only $2.2 million this weekend bringing its total to a mere $10.8 million. Resident Evil: Retribution also seems to be sinking like a stone, dropping 55.2% this weekend and now sitting at $38.7 million domestically after three weeks. 2010’s Resident Evil: Afterlife was already at $52 million domestically by this point. Has the franchise finally run its course or will international earnings give Screen Gems continued reason to make more?
And this weekend marks the end of the September doldrums with the hope October will bring brighter results. Kicking the month off next weekend we have Frankenweenie (2,900 theaters) and Taken 2 (3,000+ theaters) as the notable wide releases, while I’m not sure how many theaters ATO is throwing the fun comedy The Oranges in.
With both Hotel Transylvania and Frankenweenie in theaters at the same time I wonder if that will pose a problem for either film. I’ve seen Frankenweenie and can tell you it’s pretty good, but I do think it will scare the really young ones a little and I’m interested in Taken 2, and I’m sure we all remember the original shocked us all by bringing in $24.7 million back in 2009. Three years later will a sequel fair as well? Speak up in the comments and check out the complete top ten directly below.
