The weekend is looking almost exactly like it appeared yesterday with Total Recall and especially Diary of Wimpy Kid 3 struggling to make an impact, while The Dark Knight Rises holds on at #1.   The ShowbuzzDaily Domestic Final estimates for films opening wide this weekend:  Total Recall ($66 million) and Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Dog Days ($41 million). […]

  OPENINGS:  THE POSSESSION (Lionsgate) is doing quite well for a low-budget horror quickie, with $17.7M for the 1st 3 days of the holiday weekend, and is on track to be the #2 Labor Day opening ever, behind only the 2007 remake of Halloween.  LAWLESS (Weinstein Company), though, at $9.7M, is behind last year’s The […]

Audiences decide they want to see movies again. OPENINGS:  With the market starved for family entertainment (the last major animated opening was Ice Age 4 back in July), HOTEL TRANSYLVANIA (Sony) and its $43M smashed the September opening record and the Sony Animations record, and comes in just behind Shark Tale as the biggest animated […]

  The biggest boxoffice story of the weekend happened overseas:  in only 25 international markets, SKYFALL (Sony) the new James Bond, has opened at a scorching, record-setting pace, with a reported $77.7M in 3 days (including $32.4M in the UK alone).   The movie doesn’t open in the US for 2 weeks, but it’s already kicking […]

  No great disconnects between Saturday’s estimates and Sunday’s, although one number needs some scrutiny. OPENINGS:  RISE OF THE GUARDIANS (DreamWorks Animation/Paramount) was at the top of the new arrivals, but with a very disappointing $24M weekend ($32.6M over 5 days).  At that rate, it’s going to have to struggle to hold onto its theatres […]

Skyfall is finally starting to slow down — “only” $16 million overseas since last week.  Although still a decent haul, the weekly pace is down substantially from recent weeks.  The latest Bond film looks tantilizingly close to $1 billion worldwide, but it will have to stretch to make it. The Hobbit is really rolling overseas, with $146 […]

  OPENINGS:  ZERO DARK THIRTY (Sony) expanded to coincide with its Oscar nominations, and the strategy worked as planned, with the acclaimed (and, in some circles, attacked) drama easily carrying Friday with $9M, on its way to $25-27M for the weekend. It’s a massive embarrassment for GANGSTER SQUAD (Warners) that it was beaten by the […]

  Even if Die Hard takes the weekend, it’s running on fumes. OPENINGS:  A GOOD DAY TO DIE HARD (20th) cost at least triple the budget of SAFE HAVEN (Relativity), and had a more expensive marketing campaign as well.  Yet on Friday, only $75K separated the two–and that was after Safe Haven won Valentine’s Day to […]