CinemaNerdz

Weekend Box-Office: The Help is on the Way!

Seth Paul

It was a switcharoo at the box office this weekend: The Help took the top spot from Rise of the Planet of the Apes, with neither film suffering too handily much in estimated box office take. The Help received an estimated $20.5 million, while Apes made approximately $16.3 million. Both films are well on their way to being hits; Apes has already hit the $100 million mark, though Help isn’t very far behind, with a two week total domestic gross of $71.8 million.

The four new films of the weekend weren’t so lucky; Spy Kids 4D: All the Time in the World may have added the fourth dimension of scratch’n’sniff cards to the mix, but it only made an estimated $12 million and wasn’t received anywhere near as warmly as the previous films in the franchise, in either reviews or cash. However, it did substantially better than the well-regarded remake (and similarly budgeted) Fright Night, with an estimated $7.9 million, and One Day, with $5.1 million. However, on a pure cost-to-earnings ratio, these relatively low-budget films (One Day, with Anne Hathaway, being the lowest with $15 million) fared better than Conan the Barbarian. With a $90 million price tag, the Marcus Nispel directed action adventure may have placed 4th overall with an estimated $10 million, but like the film’s title character, has a long road to travel.

The rest of the Top 10 are all familiar faces: The Smurfs made an estimated $8 million (and a whopping $117.7 million domestic in four weeks), Final Destination 5 and 30 Minutes or Less continue to drag their feet with $7.7 million and $6.3 million respectively (both films are likely to be successes, if only just barely), and Crazy, Stupid, Love proved once again that R-rated comedies are golden…as long as those comedies aren’t The Change-Up. It made an underwhelming estimated $5 million, but is proving a modest success domestically with an overall take of $64 million.

Weekend Box-Office (August 19 – August 21)

  1. The Help…$20.5 million
  2. Rise of the Planet of the Apes…$16.3 million
  3. Spy Kids 4D: All the Time in the World…$12 million
  4. Conan the Barbarian…$10 million
  5. The Smurfs…$8 million
  6. Fright Night…$7.9 million
  7. Final Destination 5…$7.7 million
  8. 30 Minutes or Less…$6.3 million
  9. One Day…$5.1 million
  10. Crazy, Stupid, Love…$5 million

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."
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