Oscars update: Best performance at the box office this weekend
"Lust, Caution," "Into the Wild" and "Jesse James" did well among ticket-buyers over the past few days. That's the assessment of Gitesh Pandya, editor of BoxOfficeGuru.com, who gives Gold Derby readers his views of how major Oscar ponies performed this weekend. His comments are below, with one movie noticeably skipped. Gitesh can't comment on "Darjeeling Limited" because he's got a biz tie-in, but I can tell you it did socko in limited release: $140,000 from two theaters. Now here's what Gitesh thinks about how the others did:
"Lust, Caution" — Ang Lee's followup to "Brokeback Mountain" had a scorching debut this weekend from 3 screens at one theater in New York. The NC-17 rating plus the director’s name are making for a lethal combo that has generated lots of buzz. I think it's got a bright future in the weeks ahead as it expands.
"King of California" — This film has been struggling in limited release and averaged less than $2,000 over the weekend, which means it will have a tough time competing with the big boys in October.
"Into the Wild" — It's expanding very well and is getting rid of the bad taste that Sean Penn fans had after "All the King's Men" from last fall. Art-house films often lose a lot of steam when expanding beyond New York and Los Angeles, but "Wild" is holding its own and did very well in its second weekend.
"Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford" — The Brad Pitt pic has displayed some nice firepower in limited release and enjoyed a decent second weekend hold, dropping 38 percent. It still will not be an easy sell in wide release, though.
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"Eastern Promises" — "Eastern Promises" had a good but not spectacular expansion last week and now is eroding fast, losing almost half of its audience in its second weekend of nationwide play.
"In the Valley of Elah" — "Elah" has really been weakening in its expansion and seems to be finding a hard time competing in an increasingly competitive marketplace for adult dramas. Tommy Lee Jones is getting great notices, but moviegoers are flocking to other options.
"The Hunting Party" — This film ran out of gas last weekend when it went wider posting a dismal average of just over $1,000. It just doesn’t have the commercial clout to beat out all the other films targeting art-house and upscale moviegoers this fall.
(Focus Features)
I had thought I would have seen The Assassination of Jesse James by now. I had no idea that there would be such a huge gap between the NY/LA dates and the rest of us. That usually only happens at Christmas time. It sucks being a fan of good movies in the middle of nowhere. :(
Posted by: Aura | October 01, 2007 at 09:39 AM
Odd that he didn't mention Darjeeling Limited considering that he worked with Fox Searchlight on its publicity... but more significantly, it averaged $70k in two theatres in NY, that's better than what Ang Lee's movie did in one theatre AND that was in just two days, Saturday and Sunday. That's a HUGE opening for Anderson's latest though it's to be expected from the director who's very popular in NY. Will be curious to see how Into the Wild expands.
Posted by: Edward Douglas | October 01, 2007 at 05:30 AM
I loathed All The King's Men, but I never held it against Sean Penn.
Posted by: renton | October 01, 2007 at 04:37 AM