That looks really uncomfortable.
Cover your eyes, here are the numbers:
1. The Possession (Lionsgate) Week 2 [2,834 Runs] PG13
Friday $2.8M, Saturday $4.6M, Weekend $9.8M (-45%), Cume $33.7M
2. Lawless (Weinstein Co) Week 2 [3,138 Runs] R
Friday $1.7M, Saturday $2.7M, Weekend $5.8M (-41%), Cume $23.4M
2. The Words (CBS Films) New [2,801 Runs] PG13
Friday $1.6M, Saturday $2.1M, Weekend $4.9M
4. The Expendables 2 (Lionsgate) Week 4 [3,260 Runs] R
Friday $1.3M, Saturday $2.3M, Weekend $4.8M, Cume $75.5M
5. ParaNorman (Focus Features) Week 4 [2,856 Runs] PG
Friday $838K, Saturday $2.1M, Weekend $4.3M, Cume $45.5M
[Numbers from Deadline]
What can you say about the first weekend where no movie earned over $10 million since September 2008? The first weekend after Labor Day is traditionally a bad time of year, but this is hurts-the-eyes bad.
There’s not a lot to say here. “The Words” bombed but I don’t think that should be a surprise. When you see the ads for it you feel like, “What is this? Why should I care?” It just came across as kind of fuzzy and not particularly interesting. Bad reviews didn’t help, especially since CBS Films decided to target it at older women, who actually read reviews (I’m not in that audience, but I did read the reviews and it actually sounds worse when you read the plot than what you see in the as). The studio didn’t really have high hopes for the movie, which is why they decided to drop it quietly into this weekend and hope for the best.
That left the top two from last week to repeat, which I think proves the lesson “never bet against a horror movie.”
We might as well just move on and try to trudge through these next few weeks until things pick up again. Next week–we have only two wide releases, “Resident Evil: Retribution” and the 3D release of “Finding Nemo,” which should just destroy the competition. Bet the over on that one.
