The Wolverine slashes to the top!
With no other new competitors in theaters, everyone's favorite adamantium-laced mutant easily sliced his way to #1 at the box office this weekend, putting THE WOLVERINE at the top with an opening of $55 million.
While that opening figure is nearly identical to the (almost) Logan-free X-MEN: FIRST CLASS in June 2011, it's still a few notches below the lethal X-man's previous solo outing X-MEN ORIGINS: WOLVERINE, which started with $85 million (and went on to nearly $180M) — even despite being leaked online in the weeks prior to its theatrical release.
Are those claws starting to get rusty? Not overseas, where Wolvie's Japanese adventure has carved out an additional $86 million for a $141M worldwide total (THE WOLVERINE cost around $120M, which is considered "reasonable" in this summer of bloated budgets). And North American audiences enjoyed the shirtless berserker and his impressive sideburns, granting the movie an 'A-' CinemaScore, while critics mostly appreciated director James Mangold's less cartoonish handling of the character (67% on Rotten Tomatoes).
Last weekend's winner THE CONJURING took second place with another $22.1 million, a drop of less than 50% from its opening. Director James Wan's latest low-budget spooker is already at a 10-day total of $83.8 million as it reaches for a guaranteed $100+ million.
In third place is the year's second-biggest success DESPICABLE ME 2 with $16 million, for a domestic total of $306.4 million and $661 million globally (which should give Universal some comfort after their colossal flop R.I.P.D.). Sputtering along right behind Gru was another family-friendly computer-animated feature, Dreamworks' snail racer TURBO, with $13.3 million in its second weekend.
GROWN UPS 2 just crossed the $100 million mark (as have most of Sandler's comedies in the past decade), but RED 2 is likely to remain in the red at this rate — the senior spy actioner has considerable distance to make it to the first movie's $200M worldwide total, or even its $84M cost.
The oversized robots of PACIFIC RIM still have some stiff joints in the US, but Guillermo del Toro's action epic has punched to a $224M global total. Sandra Bullock and Melissa McCarthy's THE HEAT holds onto eighth place, while R.I.P.D. has both feet in the grave with a cadaverous $24.3 million total (against a budget as high as $180M). Coming up on the bottom of the list was FRUITVALE STATION, the timely true drama about a young black man fatally shot at an Oakland train station. Expanding from limited release onto a thousand additional screens, the indie (featuring "It Guy" Michael B. Jordan) collected $4.6 million.
Outside the chart, MONSTERS UNIVERSITY and WORLD WAR Z slipped away, while the new comedy THE TO-DO LIST got dissed with just $1.5 million (which also happened to be its reported production cost), and Woody Allen's acclaimed new film BLUE JASMINE opened in six locations with a remarkable $102k per-screen average.
Next weekend features the return of the little blue humanoids in THE SMURFS 2 (on Wednesday), while Denzel Washington and Mark Wahlberg will unholster 2 GUNS, and limited releases include the sci-fi thriller EUROPA REPORT and the teen drama THE SPECTACULAR NOW.
What August release are you most looking forward to seeing? VOTE HERE!
| # | MOVIE TITLE | WKND $ | TOTAL $ |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | The Wolverine | $55 M | NEW |
| 2 | The Conjuring | $22.1 M | $83.8 M |
| 3 | Despicable Me 2 | $16 M | $306.4 M |
| 4 | Turbo | $13.3 M | $55.7 M |
| 5 | Grown Ups 2 | $11.5 M | $101.6 M |
| 6 | Pacific Rim | $7.5 M | $84 M |
| 7 | Red 2 | $9.4 M | $35 M |
| 8 | The Heat | $6.8 M | $141.2 M |
| 9 | R.I.P.D. | $5.8 M | $24.3 M |
| 10 | Fruitvale Station | $4.6 M | $6.3 M |