In a weekend glutted with new releases battling the aftershocks of The Dark Knight earthquake, Tropic Thunder debuted below expectations -- but well enough to steal the top spot from The Dark Knight in that film's 5th weekend. The R-rated comedy's $26 million weekend and $37 million 5-day was roughly on par with Pineapple Express' performance the previous weekend, but I think Tropic Thunder was predicted to have broader appeal. In retrospect, the advertising may have emphasized the film's inside-baseball aspects a bit too much.Star Wars: The Clone Wars did okay in third place with $15 million -- weak for a purported Star Wars film, but not bad for a Saturday morning cartoon. The woeful Mirrors took in a relatively paltry $11 million, a wuss-out signaled by the 11th hour press screening cancellation. Contrast The Strangers, the summer's other major R-rated, non-Shyamalan horror film, which debuted to almost twice as much despite not having as nifty a high-concept.
The Dark Knight, meanwhile, continues to edge toward $500 million. Its 5-weekend total stands at $471 million, enough to top Star Wars' unadjusted numbers. Titanic still looks out of reach, even setting aside the apples-and-oranges aspect of comparing a 1997 release to a 2008 one.
Pineapple Express fell 57% in its second weekend, putting $100 million out of reach. On the other hand, Mamma Mia! continues to be popular, suffering drops of around 20% each week thanks to good word-of-mouth and likely repeat viewings.
Woody Allen's Vicky Cristina Barcelona came in at #10, with $3.7 million on 700 screens, Woody's second-best opening ever. Two spots below that, the poorly-reviewed 3-D spectacle Fly Me to the Moon made $2 million on 450 screens.
The full estimates after the jump.
1 - Tropic Thunder (Paramount) - $26.00 ($7,833) - $37.03
2 - The Dark Knight (Warner Bros.) - $16.79 ($4,676) - $471.49
3 - Star Wars: The Clone Wars (Warner Bros.) - $15.51 ($4,491) - $15.51
4 - Mirrors (Fox) - $11.13 ($4,176) - $11.13
5 - Pineapple Express (Columbia) - $10.00 ($3,255) - $62.93
6 - The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor (Universal) - $8.61 ($2,559) - $86.65
7 - Mamma Mia! (Universal) - $6.50 ($2,345) - $116.42
8 - The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2 (Warner Bros.) - $5.93 ($2,184) - $32.15
9 - Step Brothers (Columbia) - $5.00 ($1,888) - $90.89
10 - Vicky Cristina Barcelona (MGM) - $3.71 ($5,361) - $3.71
Next weekend is the official start of the post-summer lull -- we'll see The Longshots, Death Race, The House Bunny and The Rocker (on Wednesday), as well as Hamlet 2 in limited release. Expect The Rocker and Death Race to battle for the weekend win.
1. Titanic had a decent run but it was in theaters for more than 10 months before coming out on video.(December 19th 1997- September 27th 1998)
Films now don't stick around this long to accumulate large sums of cash. If you look at the break down it made decent weekends but it was just around long enough to add the total up. Most weekends after some time it was just pulling in 2-3 million a weekend, but after months of that it added up.
I think if the dark knight was left in theaters as long as titanic it could easily catch up. The problems is the difference of the time an markets. We are used to only waiting 6 months or less and the dvd is already coming out.
So unless a film pulls in insane amount of cash in the relatively short time they live in theaters, they will never catch titanic.
Posted at 9:51PM on Aug 17th 2008 by Sparkus