Thanks to the funky Christmas schedule, five major releases hit in the middle of the week, (Wolf of Wall Street, Walter Mitty, 47 Ronin, Grudge Match, and Believe). Of those, the big standouts (not in a good way) were 47 Ronin, Grudge Match, and Believe. Grudge Match only managed $7.3 million domestic for the weekend, despite all those glowing reviews from random twitter users trumpeted in the TV spots. Justin Bieber’s Believe debuted way down in 14th place with just $2 million. This after the last Bieber doc opened with $28.8 million two years ago. Some might argue that an already over-exposed twink doesn’t need two documentaries about him before he’s 20, but not me, I love seeing that plucky underdog prove the h8rs wrong. Baby, baby, baby, ohhhh….
But of course, the winner of the shit sandwich sweepstakes was Keanu Reeves’ much delayed samurai (I think?) epic, 47 Ronin, from commercial director Carl Rinsch, who was once slated to make the movie that became Prometheus. Ronin earned just $9.9 million in the US. Which wouldn’t be so bad, if the movie had cost $10 or $20 million, but Ronin‘s reported budget was $200 million Other stories have put it as high as $225 million, which reportedly led to Rinsch getting fired during post-production. The reviews were worse than Grudge Match, and it’s not doing that well internationally either. According to some projections, Universal stands to lose as much as $175 million on it. I can’t imagine any of this is good news for Carl Rinsch. But hey, maybe he can bounce back by directing the next few Justin Bieber documentaries. I’ve got my fingers crossed for Alpaca Lips Now, documenting how the Bieb was tragically spat to death by herd animals after a concert in Bolivia.
[via BoxOfficeMojo]
Other notes:
Wolf of Wall Street‘s audience was 54 percent male, and a whopping 90 percent were 25 years of age or older. They awarded it a terrible “C” CinemaScore; on the surface, that suggests the movie will burn out quickly, though the controversy about the movie’s borderline pornographic content could spur some interest. If Wolf also garners a handful of Oscar nominations, it could theoretically flirt with $100 million before the end of its run. [BoxOfficeMojo]
The post-Christmas weekend can be one of the biggest of the year. And so it was. The top 10 grossed $171 million, up a healthy $17 million from 2012, which nudges the year’s totals slightly ahead of 2012. [thompsononHollywood]
Get ready for the stupid season, as next week brings us Paranormal Activity: The Marked Ones, and the following week offers the Kellen Lutz Hercules movie. God, January sucks.