This weekend at the box office was very crowded, with four films opening, but it was Matt Damon’s film Elysium which came away with the #1 spot.
District 9 director Neill Blomkamp’s followup film was expected to pull in between $35-40 million domestically. It ended up just breaking $30 million in the U.S. and made another $10M in foreign markets. With decent reviews, we imagine it will do fairly well, hopefully recouping its $115 million dollar budget and more.
We’re the Millers, starring Jason Sudeikis, Jennifer Aniston, Ed Helms, and Emma Roberts didn’t totally disappoint. The comedy pulled in $26.5 million, and garnered below average reviews. With such a crowded weekend, it did better than most insiders had expected.
Disney’s latest animated flick, Planes, also landed in theaters this weekend. We imagine Disney was hoping to see numbers somewhat similar to what they saw with their highly successful Cars franchise, but so far it hasn’t been the case. If the film stays on its current course, it’s unlikely that a sequel will be in the works.
Pulling in $22.5 million, it certainly isn’t a total loss so far, but we have to imagine Disney was hoping for a bit more. Luckily they were able to keep its budget down to a surprisingly low $50 million. Compared to Cars’ $120 million dollar budget, and Cars 2’s $200 million dollar budget, they may have know that it wouldn’t see similar success.
So while Planes didn’t quite make a killing during its opening weekend, it wasn’t nearly the risk that the original Cars was. If foreign markets end up being more receptive to the film, it could end up making a nice profit due to its lower budget.
Percy Jackson: Sea of Monsters may be the weekend’s biggest disappointment, bringing in a weekend total of only $14.6 million. This isn’t entirely surprising, considering the reviews for the film were very poor out of the gate. It probably didn’t help that the first film disappointed the majority of fans of the Percy Jackson novels.
The bad news is the film had a fairly substantial budget. With $90 million invested in its production, plus a sizable promotional campaign, Fox is certainly in worry-mode after seeing its weekend total. Maybe once Sea of Monsters has some breathing room at the theaters, more fans of the books will go check out the adaptation for themselves.
Hugh Jackman’s The Wolverine has continued to do well despite mixed reviews. The film crossed $300 million worldwide this weekend, while rumors swirled this past week that another sequel is already being penned. Jackman will be seen next as his most popular character in director Bryan Singer’s X-Men: Days of Future Past.