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Posted February 2, 2015 by Seth Paul in News
 
 

Box Office Weekend: Third Times a Charm for Sniper


There were three new releases this week, but with American Sniper reigning once more at the top of the box office with an estimated $31.9 million…and at $248.9 million and counting, it is the fifth highest earning R-Rated film of all time…it is understandable that they are not exactly the top draws, especially considering their critical reception. Even Paddington, for instance, entered its third week in second place with an estimated $8.5 American Snipermillion, just edging out the estimated $8.5 million for the time travel suspense thriller Project Almanac (though at only $12 million to make, it does not have much work to become profitable), and doing far better than the latest Kevin Costner vehicle Black or White, which brought in an estimated $6.5 million. Neither film is making much headway critically, but both have weathered those storms better than The Loft, a Karl Urban-starring Hitchcockian thriller which debuted in tenth with an estimated $2.9 million.

In between, things seem to be going about as expected; The Boy Next Door may not be a barn burner, but at an estimated $6.1 million and $24.7 million over a $4 million budget, it has done incredibly well on a sliding scale, while an estimated $5.7 million for The Wedding Ringer puts it on solid footing with $48.1 million.

The Imitation Game has still released no numbers, but with an estimated $5.2 million and a domestic total of $68 million, the biopic has probably done good business. Taken 3 and its estimated $3.7 million is still a low water mark for the franchise domestically, but worldwide it has done nearly as well as Taken 2…speaking of which, a franchise does not appear likely for the unfortunate Strange Magic. At an estimated $3.4 million, it is the only film in the top ten to have not debuted this week to have made less than $10 million domestically, and as a CG film, a likely disastrous flop in the making.

Weekend Box Office (January 30th –February 1st)

  1. American Sniper…$31.9 million
  2. Paddington…$8.5 million
  3. Project Almanac…$8.5 million
  4. Black and White…$6.5 million
  5. The Boy Next Door…$6.1 million
  6. The Wedding Ringer…$5.7 million
  7. The Imitation Game…$5.2 million
  8. Taken 3…$3.7 million
  9. Strange Magic…$3.4 million
  10. The Loft…$2.9 million
Seth Paul

Seth Paul

When not failing to write novels and screenplays, box-office guru Seth writes humorous comedy tracks for films under the name "The One Man Band" that can be found at Rifftrax.com. Although, he has recently succeeded in writing the novella "Jack Alan and the Case of the Not-Exactly Rocket Scientists," available as an eBook on Amazon. He is also the English voice of Zak in "Zak McKracken: Between Time and Space."