Weekend Box Office: Drab, Drab, Drab

Well, this was the latest limp weekend of the creatively deadened summer 2010 season.

Read on for the complete rundown!

After the colossally disappointing Memorial Day weekend, the studios were hoping that a handful of new releases would liven up the box office: ‘Marmaduke,’ ‘Get Him to the Greek,’ ‘Splice,’ and ‘Killers‘. Sadly, that didn’t happen. Only recently did I think about how silly it was that Universal would bet a bunch of money on the spin-off to a moderately successful romantic comedy. (That’d be ‘Greek’ for those playing at home.) Anyway, the box office speaks for itself.

Again, the jolly green ogre was #1 at the box office, as the folks at DreamWorks Animation count down the days until ‘Toy Story 3’ opens and leaves ‘Shrek Forever After‘ feeling like a distant, painful memory. What’s so striking about this ‘Shrek’ entry’s success is that it’s not some runaway hit. It’s just slightly better than anything else, eking out enough each week to remain at Number One (this week with $24.3 million).

‘Get Him to the Greek’ debuted at #2 with $17.4 million. This could be a word-of-mouth sleeper. The people I talked to this weekend who paid to see it generally seemed to enjoy it. It’s not a bad movie, exactly. It’s just not a very good one. Quite frankly, “not very good” could still equal big dollars.

Speaking of “not very good”… ‘Killers,’ the lame duck action comedy that Lionsgate refused to screen for critics, opened at #3, amazingly, with $16.1 million. I guess people were really bored this weekend. This will take a huge dip next weekend, for sure.

Prince of Persia‘ hung in at #4, which means that it may make a little bit of money before bowing out of the box office ostrich race. It’s such an awful movie, with such limited appeal (in my eyes) that I can’t imagine it will actually make any of its money back. Expect all that ‘Prince of Persia’ merchandise on super-deluxe discount sales very, very soon. (Sorry, Disney, they can’t all be ‘Pirates.’)

The other two debuts this week didn’t fare much better.

‘Marmaduke,’ which proves that not every talking animal movie will do the box office of ‘Alvin and the Chipmunks,’ came in at miserable sixth place. Meanwhile, ‘Splice,’ the creepy, kooky, very funny sci-fi shocker from Warner Bros. and Joel Silver’s Dark Castle production shingle, bowed at EIGHTH PLACE. Whew. That’s just bad. Especially for a movie that’s so wonderful. Oh well. It’ll be out on DVD/Blu-ray by the time Halloween rolls around, which is a plus.

There isn’t a whole lot else to report on this week’s box office, besides the fact that it looks like ‘Iron Man 2’ could slip out of the Top 10 before it makes $300 million, and ‘Robin Hood’ could bow out before it reaches the $100 million mark. Not exactly staggering returns on two of the most hotly tipped summer blockbusters. Maybe they should have been in 3-D?

Top 10, Here We Go Again:

01 ‘Shrek Forever After’ (DreamWorks Animation) – $24.3 million

02 ‘Get Him to the Greek’ (Universal) – $17.4 million

03 ‘Killers’ (Lionsgate) – $16.1 million

04 ‘Prince of Persia’ (Disney) – $13.9 million

05 ‘Sex and the City 2’ (Warner Bros) – $12.6 million

06 ‘Marmaduke’ (Fox) – $11.3 million

07 ‘Iron Man 2’ (Paramount/Marvel Studios) – $7.7 million

08 ‘Splice’ (Warner Bros/Dark Castle) – $7.4 million

09 ‘Robin Hood’ (Universal) – $5.1 million

10 ‘Letters to Juliet’ (Summit) – $3 million

3 comments

  1. Jane Morgan

    2010 Worldwide Grosses (in millions):

    1013 – Alice in Wonderland
    580 – Iron Man 2
    475 – Clash of the Titans
    467 – How To Train Your Dragon
    295 – Shutter Island
    266 – Robin Hood
    251 – Shrek Forever After
    221 – Percy Jackson & The Olympians
    216 – Prince of Persia
    213 – Valentine’s Day
    163 – Sex in the City 2
    100 – Nightmare on Elm Street

    Drew, your logic is fuzzy. Worldwide box office only accounts for about 40% of a film’s profit.

    Robin Hood and Prince of Persia will more than break even. They won’t make billions, but they will both earn a profit on their investment.

    Iron Man 2 is the second biggest movie of the year. Why belittle it in such an obscure way?

  2. Joe B

    It’s very simple. The pictures are awful and only the kiddie market is going to see them. Yes, it’s the biggest market, but faithful, decades-long movie goers are so uninterested in the current product they, like me, are staying away. In 2008-2009, I paid for admission to at least 20 films. In 2009-2010 I saw about 5– and three of them were in IMAX or IMAX-3D (Potter, IronMan2, Train..Dragon).
    So, I am only one aging movie-goer who is finally (and reluctantly) moving his main movie viewing to the home screen– and no goddam cable or satellite either! Netflix serves just fine!

  3. Motorheadache

    As far as Splice goes, I’m not terribly surprised it isn’t doing so good. I haven’t seen it yet, but the trailer made it look like an abysmal Species knock-off. From what I’ve heard since, it’s apparently scary, funny, and quite good, but you would’ve never known from that trailer.

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