As happily predicted, Pixar’s Up won the box office this weekend with a heavenly $68.2 million. Some are calling it the best movie of 2009, which is exactly what they said about Wall-E last year. I suppose it’s the norm with any Pixar movie; the quality movies they produce year after year simply never disappoint, even if they never go on to win Best Picture at the Academy Awards.
Here’s the top five this weekend:
1. NEW! Up (Buena Vista) – $68.2 mil; 3,766 theaters; $18,109 PT
2. Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian (Fox) – $25.5 mil; 4,101 theaters; $6,218 PT; $105.2 mil cume
3. NEW! Drag Me to Hell (Universal) – $16.6 mil; 2,508 theaters; $6,630 PT
4. Terminator Salvation (WB) – $16.1 mil; 3,602 theaters; $4,481 PT; $90.6 mil cume
5. Star Trek (Paramount) – $12.8 mil; 3,507 theaters; $3,650 PT; $209.5 mil cume
I thought Night at the Museum 2 would have made more in its second week, but I guess Up pretty much stole away the same audience, so makes sense it would fall behind. Meanwhile, the critically lauded Drag Me to Hell (welcome back to horror, Sam Raimi!) held its own in third place and should have a nice little run over the summer.
Star Trek is still booming, having crossed the $200 mil mark, but there’s talk about how we might not have the same smash summer we did last year, when films such as Iron Man, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull and The Dark Knight made HUGE money (over $300 mil each). Sure, movies are still proving to be a relief in these tough economic times, but none of the big guns so far this summer – Wolverine, Star Trek, Angels and Demons, Terminator and Night at the Museum – have made more than $90 mil their opening weekend. And as far as big moneymakers, all that’s really left this summer is Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen and Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. I don’t really care about all the money stuff – I’m just having a good time this summer. Aside from maybe Wolverine, for me, there hasn’t been a major disappointment yet.
This coming weekend is a little tougher to predict, being that it’s a battle between the balls-out comedies Land of the Lost and The Hangover. You know how I feel about LOTL already, but let me tell you, I’ve already seen The Hangover and it’s DAMN funny. So, it’s up in the air for me on which will do better.