Weekend Box Office: You Got Some ‘Splainin To Do!

Although this weekend was down yet again compared to last July’s box office numbers, the results held some surprises.

Dethroning ‘The Purge: Anarchy’ in its short-living solitary week atop the charts was Scarlett Johansson’s R-rated action flick ‘Lucy‘. From director Luc Besson, the wild and weird sci-fi fight-fest pulled in $44 million from its 3,000+ locations, giving it a healthy per-screen average of $13,875. The $40 million French flick has yet to open overseas, but will presumably do pretty well.

The lowdown on ‘The Rundown’ star’s new movie is that it’s a letdown. Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson’s heavily advertised ‘Hercules‘ debuted to $29 million, enough to lock in the #2 spot at the box office. The generic-looking 3D epic opened to even less than Johnson’s 2002 ‘The Scorpion King‘ ($36 million). Even though ‘Hercules’ won’t hit $100 million domestically, with a $28.7 million start overseas, it’s likely to come out with more than $200 million internationally.

In its third weekend, ‘Dawn of the Planet of the Apes‘ took its first steep decline. Falling 54.8% in attendance, the film only locked in $16.4 million. That’s still more than enough to place it in the #3 spot. After 17 days, those damn dirty apes have earned $172 million.

The Purge: Anarchy‘ dropped a massive 66.8% in its second weekend, falling from first to fourth place. The $9.8 million weekend brings the sequel’s ten-day total up to $51.2 million. This indicates that it’s highly likely to surpass the first ‘Purge’ movie’s $64.5 million run.

Disney’s ‘Planes: Fire & Rescue‘ dropped 47% and fell from third to fifth place. The kid’s flick hasn’t stalled yet, but it’s sputtering. The $9.3 million second weekend brings its ten-day total up to $35.1 million. At this point in its run, the first ‘Planes’ movie had a ten-day total $10 million higher than that.

The Diane Keaton and Michael Douglas romantic comedy ‘And So It Goes‘ was yet another weak opening for the tiny studio that gave us this year’s earlier flop ‘The Legends of Oz: Dorothy’s Return’. From 1,700+ locations, the picture only scraped by with $4.5 million. That’s just enough to land it in the #8 spot.

A Most Wanted Man‘ rounded out the Top 10 with $2.7 million. That’s very impressive for an indie flick showing on 361 screens. Phillip Seymour Hoffman’s final leading role scored a $7,526 per-screen average.

Gabriel Iglesias’ stand-up comedy feature wasn’t able to match the success of similar outings by Kevin Hart. ‘The Fluffy Movie‘ grossed $1.3 million from 432 locations and finished in the #16 spot. In comparison, Hart’s ‘Laugh at My Pain’ debuted to $1.9 million from just 98 screens.

Top 10:

1. ‘Lucy’ (Universal) – $44,025,000

2. ‘Hercules’ (Paramount) – $29,000,000

3. ‘Dawn of the Planet of the Apes’ (Fox) – $16,400,000

4. ‘The Purge: Anarchy’ (Universal) – $9,896,000

5. ‘Planes: Fire & Rescue’ (Buena Vista) – $9,303,000

6. ‘Sex Tape’ (Sony) – $5,975,000

7. ‘Transformers: Age of Extinction’ (Paramount) – $4,600,000

8. ‘And So It Goes’ (Clarius) – $4,552,000

9. ‘Tammy’ (Warner Bros.) – $3,400,000

10. ‘A Most Wanted Man’ (Roadside) – $2,717,000

10 comments

  1. NJScorpio

    So…’Lucy’ is super smart, but holds a gun like that?

    Anyway…

    I really wanted ‘Hercules’ to be a big hit for ‘The Rock’. He is a decent actor, with a good sense of comedic timing.

    This reminds me…what ever happened to Vin Diesel’s ‘Hannibal’?

    • Bill McClain

      Holding the gun: I always want to ask “Where did you learn that? From the crackhead handbook? Does that come with a video?”

      -Bill

    • Uh….its Brett Ratner and the movie from the first preview looked super generic. It had some cool shots but it was another GI Joe type flick laden with too much CGI and as much as I love the Rock in most things, he never grabbed me as Hercules. His line screaming, “I am HERCULES” was cheese at its best and much expected from a Brett Ratner film, I’m sure that line had people laughing when they first saw that preview. I figured it would be number 1 being that the Rock was the biggest earner last year with his movies, but I guess even that couldnt get people to care enough about the movie, even as a fan of his I wasnt caring much about bothering till Bluray.

      Props to Lucy, Scarlet and Luc Besson, The Fifth Element is one of my all time favs and this one I definitely want to see

      • NJScorpio

        I agree, everything I saw for it seemed so generic. The first place I heard about it? Promo material up at a Red Robin. Also, from what I recall, the most notable thing he is fighting is a really big pig.

        So yeah, all the previews looked very dull, but despite that I was rooting for Dwayne. He seems like a good guy.

  2. Drew

    Correction: ‘The Purge: Anarchy’ never topped the charts. ‘Dawn of the Planet of the Apes’ was the previous weekend’s chart topper.

  3. Drew

    ‘The Purge: Anarchy‘ dropped a massive 66.8% in its second weekend, falling from first to fourth place.

    It didn’t drop from first to fourth place. It dropped from second to fourth.

    • It still made some money, first one cost what $3 million or something to make, I cant imagine the 2nd was a ton more, probably with the bigger scope they spent some more but it will still make bank. Definitely one I want to see

    • William Henley

      Truthfully, I plan to go see it if it is still in theaters this weekend (I actually thought it was a Fathom event, and I was busy all last weekend). I got a theater that has $3 2D matinees. I think he is hillarious.

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