Audiences Wanted WALL-E, Jolie
The robot fought Angelina Jolie to a draw.
WALL-E, the new Disney/Pixar film about a lonely little robot, grossed $62.5 million to top the weekend box office, according to Exhibitor Relations estimates today.
But pound for pound, Wanted was the bigger film.
Debuting at about 800 fewer theaters than WALL-E, Wanted, the Jolie action film, outgrossed the animated movie by nearly $500 per screen. It’s a statistical win that can be credited to its star’s pull with young men, yes, but also to its wealth of full-price admission tickets. (Wanted is rated R, while WALL-E is rated G for “good for a kid’s discount.”)
In the box office standings, Wanted finished second, with a $51.1 million take.
According to Box Office Mojo stats, WALL-E’s opening was the best for a Pixar film since 2004’s The Incredibles, and was a substantial upgrade over last summer’s critically acclaimed though rat-addled entry, Ratatouille, which debuted with $47 million.
Wanted becomes Jolie’s biggest opener ever, outdoing the first Lara Croft movie and Mr. & Mrs. Smith, which costarred Brad Pitt.
The box office’s latest one-two punch, coming a few weeks after the Kung Fu Panda/You Don’t Mess with the Zohan combo, helped push Hollywood into the black. For the first time in a long while, ticket sales are up over where they were at this point last year. Overall attendance, however, is still down.
WALL-E and Jolie, after all, are only two people. Well, one robot and one pregnant-with-twins superstar.
Other notable box office doings:
- Last weekend’s No. 1 movie, Steve Carell’s Get Smart, fell to third, but hung tough (i.e., ticket sales were down less than 50 percent). Its $20 million gross pushed its overall take to $77.3 million.
- Last weekend’s disappointment, Mike Myers’ The Love Guru, fell from fourth to sixth, and saw its modest business plunge 61 percent. Its $5.4 million gross pushed, if that’s the word, its overall take to, um, $25.3 million.
- Kung Fu Panda (fourth place, $11.7 million) kept on keeping on, and neared the $180 million cumulative mark.
- Sex and the City (ninth place, $3.8 million) moved past the $140 million mark.
- A moment of silence, please, for Iron Man, which slipped out of the Top 10 after eight scorching weekends. The film still came up with another $2.3 million, and saw its league-leading overall gross hit $309.2 million.
- Also dropping out of the Top 10: the horror-thriller The Strangers ($611,000, per Box Office Mojo), which has $51.5 million in the bank after five solid weekends.
- Abigail Breslin’s Kit Kittredge: An American Girl cleaned up again in limited release. The film took in $106,000 at five theaters, Box Office Mojo said. It goes wide on Wednesday.
- Trumbo, the new documentary about blacklisted screenwriter Dalton Trumbo, did well, grossing $28,500 at three theaters.
Here’s a recap of the top-grossing weekend films based on Friday-Sunday estimates compiled by Exhibitor Relations:
- WALL-E, $62.5 million
- Wanted, $51.1 million
- Get Smart, $20 million
- Kung Fu Panda, $11.7 million
- The Incredible Hulk, $9.2 million
- The Love Guru, $5.4 million
- Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, $5 million
- The Happening, $3.9 million
- Sex and the City, $3.8 million
- You Don’t Mess With the Zohan, $3.2 million
Superbad: The Action Movie Trailer
SuperBad: The Action Movie Trailer
The Pitch: What if SuperBad was an action movie? RM18CPR remixed a SuperBad movie trailer as if the R-Rated comedy were an epic-level action film.
via: filmdetail
District B14
A sequel to the 2004 French parkour action film District B13 is set to begin production in July. Written by Luc Besson, and directed by Patrick Alessandrin (Mean Spirit, August 15th), the sequel will be titled Banlieue 14 (or District B14 in the states). No plot details have been released, we only know that an open casting call for parkour practitioners has been put out on the official blog. The first film is best known for it’s intense parkour chase sequences.
For those that might not know what parkour is, wikipedia defines it as “an activity with the aim of moving from one point to another as efficiently and quickly as possible, using principally the abilities of the human body. It is meant to help one overcome obstacles, which can be anything in the surrounding environment—from branches and rocks to rails and concrete walls—and can be practiced in both rural and urban areas.” The most mainstream use of parkour in film is probably the opening chase sequence from Casino Royale. You can watch a chase sequence from the first film below.
via: Twitch
Transporter 3 French Teaser Trailer
Lionsgate released the first international (French) teaser trailer for Transporter 3. Jason Statham is back as Frank Martin, a professional “transporter” who has relocated to Paris to continue his low-key business of delivering packages without questions. Louis Leterrier opted to direct The Incredible Hulk instead of the third film, so French filmmaker and former graffiti artist Olivier Megaton (Second unit director for the Luc Besson produced Hitman) has attempted to fill his shoes. Robert Knepper, who you might know from Prison Break, appears as a villain. Judging from the intense teaser trailer, which looked like a mix of Transporter, Speed and Crank, we’re in for another kick ass action film. Tell me what you think in the comments below.
Watch the new teaser in High Definition on Allocine.fr. Transporter 3 will hit theaters on November 26th 2008.