No, no. Not the top ten actual grosses from last weekend but ten things worth noting.
1. Any article about this weekend's movies that does not mention Short Term 12 is just a giant waste of time. Expanding into 30+ more cities, this awesome indie climbed the box office charts escalating its gross to a healthy ½ million to date. Congratulations to writer/director Destin Cretton and Brie Larson (interviewed right here at TFE) and everyone involved with this wonderful movie. But most of all let's thank Cinedigm and their publicity team for really getting behind this one. Securing distribution is only half the battle. Once you've got a distributor, you had better hope someone really believes in your movie. And several someones did.
2. Insidious Chapter 2 opened at #1 with a huge $40.2 million, making it Patrick Wilson's second smash hit horror movie of the year. He's found his niche, however different that niche is than I expected when I first fell for him.
3. The Family, Michelle Pfeiffer's pfirst leading role since Chéri (2009) and only her third in the past ten years (jesus!) opened in second place with $14 million. That's neither here nor there as openings go but at least she's in a movie again! We'll talk about that one soon.
seven more brief notations about current movies after the jump
4. Lee Daniels' The Butler crossed the $100 million mark. That's always a major feat for pure dramas in this day and age that don't feature superheroes. Okay, okay, you could argue that Oprah Winfrey is a superhero but the only flight-ready costume was that black and white crocheted pantsuit
5. Elysium still exists. I had forgotten all about it despite not hating it at first (it did not age well in the brain). And people bought $2.1 million worth of tickets to it. Who are these people and shouldn't they be at...
6. The World's End instead (which only took in 1.3 in its 4th week)? Despite all the geek hype it has been struggling with only 23.9 million in the till despite making its fan base very very happy. I didn't love it but I am not one of the Cornetto Trilogy cultists despite liking the other two a fair amount.
7. The Mortal Instruments City of Bones lost nearly 1000 theaters in its 4th weekend proving decisively that it is not the next Twilight/Hunger Games (and will be limping to a final gross somewhere in the 30 million range i.e. half its budget). Now everyone will move on to hoping that Divergent is. But there's no shortage of teen female dystopias awaiting adaptation if that one doesn't pan out either.
8. Mother of George won the best Per Screen Average for the weekend although it was only on 1 screen. I've only heard good word. Bradford Young shot it so you know, at the very least, that it'll be one of the most beautiful movies in theaters.
9. The Spectacular Now is still expanding but it's per screen average indicates it's probably about done with just under $6 million grossed. I was going to be all "i can't believe that didn't catch on" but then I realized that the best high school movies rarely do. They grow in fame later when people can rent and stream them.
10. I have not met one person who has seen We're The Millers and I haven't even overheard one casual mention of it in conversation (and I love to eavesdrop on movie talk from strangers in NYC) yet it has earned $131 million to date which only goes to show you that a) we live in bubbles and b) Jennifer Aniston will haunt us forever with one bad movie after another making bank. The world would be an infinitely better place if the general public had decided they were most interested in the creative output of Lisa Kudrow post-Friends.
What did you see this weekend?