Weekend Box-Office: July 29-31, 2011

UPDATE: The actual
figures are in and COWBOYS & ALIENS was the #1 movie of this
past weekend. See numbers below….

Cowboys
vs Smurfs! Too close to call!

On Friday, if we had asked you
what film would be #1 over this past weekend, I’m not sure many of
you would have chosen THE SMURFS over COWBOYS & ALIENS,
especially with most
critics ravaging THE SMURFS, but early Sunday estimates
indicate that both films scored approximately $36.2M over the
weekend, which has to be somewhat disappointing for COWBOYS which
was loaded with star names, Jon Favreau’s IRON MAN background and
a budget of close to $165M. Yipes! We’ll update this story on
Monday with the "actual figures".

That said, word on the street
is that THE SMURFS also cost $110M to produce (like…seriously??),
so both films still have a way to go before making their money
back, although they both will also count on international dollars
to do so. COWBOYS & ALIENS was fighting an uphill battle from
the start with the "genre-mixing" that audiences
generally stay away from (is it a comedy, a western, a sci-fi
movie…?), but from my personal point of view, if we don’t
support films like this, Hollywood will continue to churn out
SHREKS, SAWS and FINAL DESTINATIONS ’till the cows come home. I
was able to check it out over the weekend and enjoyed it
overall.

As for the other new release of
the weekend, CRAZY STUPID LOVE managed a decent opening with a 5th
place finish of $19M, but at the same time, nothing to write home
about. In the meantime, last weekend’s #1 movie, CAPTAIN AMERICA,
lost over 60% of its audience from last week and dropped to 3rd
place this weekend, although it has already grossed $116M in the
first 10 days of its release, which ain’t too shabby (budget:
$140M).

The final installment of the
HARRY POTTER franchise also dropped another 50% of its audience
from last weekend, but still managed to add another $22M to its
total, which has now officially become the highest-grossing POTTER
movie of all-time ($319M domestically and over $1B
globally). 

And while a film like HORRIBLE BOSSES is close to
crossing the $100M mark, I’m happy to report that crap like
ZOOKEEPER will barely make its budget back as it now stands at
$68M, with a budget of $80M. CARS 2 also appears to be stalling
in 11th place on the list of 12 Pixar animated movies, with
only A BUG’S LIFE (the studio’s 2nd animated film ever)
grossing less money. Hopefully that lets the great folks at Pixar
know that audiences are not looking for "mediocre"
sequels that seem to be created mostly for the purposes of
merchandising. Story has always been #1 at Pixar and they seem to
have forgotten that this time around. Hopefully that will change
with their next release.

The 3 films to get booted from the top 10 this
weekend include WINNIE THE POOH ($22M), MIDNIGHT IN PARIS ($47M)
and BAD TEACHER ($97M) which turned into a very profitable movie,
considering that it only cost about $20M to make.

Next weekend sees the release of two major films
including the confusing-looking THE
CHANGE-UP starring Ryan Reynolds and Jason Bateman, two
actors that I like a lot, but who just seem to be going through
the motions here. Hopefully the trailers ain’t selling the film
well enough. The other movie is the one with the overlong title RISE
OF THE PLANET OF THE APES (why not simply call it RISE OF
THE APES?) which honestly seems to be intriguing a lot of people
that I’ve spoken to. Everyone seems to be saying, "Hmmmm, I’m
curious to see how this comes out". If the film actually
entertains, it may turn into a late summer surprise. THE
WHISTLEBLOWER starring Rachel Weisz is also opening next
Friday, although I’m not 100% sure if it’s a wide or limited
release. So are you interesting in seeing RISE OF THE PLANET OF
THE APES? VOTE
HERE!!!