Freeman and Nicholson do their odd couple on one last party thing.
Now that everyone’s seen National Treasure 2: Book of Secrets and I Am Legend, audiences were left with The Bucket List as one of the weekend’s few new offerings.
The oh-those-crazy-seniors comedy appeared to have edged First Sunday for the number 1 slot, taking in $19.5 million to the Ice Cube comedy’s $19 million (all numbers courtesy of Variety, btw). With numbers that close, though, look for a possible position swap in the next few days. Juno, with $14 million, came in third, knocking 2004′s Sideways off its top-grossing Searchlight release pedestal. National Treasure 2 and Alvin and the Very Wealthy Chipmunks filled out the top five.
Dan Fellman explained Bucket’s success this way:
“Everyone wanted to see these two actors together in one movie,” he said. “It’s well-positioned heading into the holiday weekend and will start to play a little younger as it goes.”
Okay.
In the art department, Atonement hung in there at 10th place with $4.3 million. There Will Be Blood expanded to 129 locations, averaging $15039 per showing. The intense oil epic gets tested further next week when it increases to 375-400 theaters.
Ahh, next week…look for more excitement over the holiday weekend when the endlessly buzzed about Cloverfield faces off against super-counterprogrammer 27 Dresses.
