CinemaNerdz

Weekend Box-Office: New Year’s Eve Winner of the Non-Winning Weekend

Seth Paul

Small numbers last week, smaller ones this week…that doesn’t bode well for the two new films debuting on this week’s Top 10, which finally managed to dethrone The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn – Part 1 from the top spot. New Year’s Eve opened to an estimated $13.7 million, while the Jonah Hill comedy The Sitter opened to an estimated $10 million. Breaking Dawn – Part 1 slid to third place with an estimated $7.5 million; however, unlike its two successors, it has had a long and comfortable ride at the top with nearly $260 million in domestic revenue, making the poor reviews for New Year’s Eve and The Sitter likely to harm them in the long term.

Looking at the middle, however, are four films that are sitting well with critics, even if their hauls aren’t nearly as impressive as Breaking Dawn. The Muppets comes closest, picking up an estimated $7.1 million this weekend and a winner, if not a pure runaway hit, with $65 million in domestic earnings. However, despite good reviews, Arthur Christmas and Hugo are still struggling to make ends meet; neither film has released its budget data, but Arthur Christmas’s estimated $6.6 million and Hugo’s estimated $6.1 million puts them neck-and-neck with around $33 million apiece in domestic gross, both probably far below their costs to make. The Descendants also has not released its budget data, but it still appears to be swimming against the current, the only film to make more money this weekend than last, with an estimated $4.8 million.

The final three films return to a realm of critical disappointment, although one has managed to prove financially successful without help from overseas markets. Happy Feet Two landed in eighth with an estimated $3.8 million, and in domestic terms has only made $56.9 million, far below the costs of most 3D animated films (and with the star power and unreported budget, that number may be larger than Warner Bros. wants to admit). Still, with foreign aid, it has managed to break the $100 million mark. Jack and Jill appears to be less successful overall, though it has done better domestically (an estimated $3.2 million this weekend, $68.6 million domestic), but it still needed a small pickup from overseas ($15 million) to make it profitable. Immortals is the only film to have proven relatively critic-proof, proving successful here and overseas, and in its fifth week managed to hang around in the top ten for an estimated $2.4 million, $80 million in domestic gross, and $102 million in overseas earnings.

Weekend Box-Office (December 9 – December 11)

  1. New Year’s Eve…$13.7 million
  2. The Sitter…$10 million
  3. The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn – Part 1…$7.5 million
  4. The Muppets…$7.1 million
  5. Arthur Christmas…$6.6 million
  6. Hugo…$6.1 million
  7. The Descendants…$4.8 million
  8. Happy Feet Two…$3.8 million
  9. Jack and Jill…$3.2 million
  10. Immortals…$2.4 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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