Weekend Box Office: October 14-16

 

Courtesy of Box Office Mojo:

1.  Real Steel - $16.3 million

2.  Footloose - $16.1 million

3.  The Thing - $8.7 million

4.  The Ides of March - $7.5 million

5.  Dolphin Tale - $6.3 million

6.  Moneyball - $5.5 million

7.  50/50 - $4.3 million

8.  Courageous - $3.4 million

9.  The Big Year - $3.3 million

10.  The Lion King 3D - $2.7 million

Well, I can't say I'm not enjoying this:  two 80s remakes get beaten out by a movie that looks like 80s movie.  The weekend, which was overall not much to write home about at the box office, ended in an almost too-close-to-call finish, with Real Steel just edging out the remake of Footloose to take first place for the second weekend in a row.  With a difference of less than $1 million between them, it's possible Footloose could overtake Real Steel when the actual numbers are tallied up tomorrow.  But considering that Real Steel seems to be scoring with family audiences - the film jumped over 60% from Friday to Saturday - I think that movie has the edge to keep its first place hold.

So what happened with Footloose?  Well, considering the remake was only budgeted around $24 million, it will almost certainly still make its money back, even though it finished the weekend well below the $20 million that was originally projected.  But it also means that audiences were (hopefully) not see eager to see this movie remade, despite some surprisingly positive reviews.  Certainly doesn't bode well for the planned remake of Dirty Dancing that seemed like such a good idea to...no one.

At least Footloose fared better than The Thing.  That remake (of a remake) disappointed this weekend with a lackluster $8.7 million.  But that was a blockbuster compared to the weekend's other new release, the Steve Martin/Jack Black/Owen Wilson comedy The Big Year, which outright bombed with $3.3 million.  That movie was almost beaten out by The Lion King 3D - a 17-year-old movie that was re-released on DVD last week.  Ouch.

Since there's not much out there for the grownups, George Clooney's political thriller The Ides of March had another good weekend, dropping only 28% to earn another $7.5 million.  Dolphin Tale still proved popular with the family crowds - this weekend's $6.3 million brought its domestic total up to $58 million.

Next weekend brings the home video scares back to the big screen with Paranormal Activity 3, as well as yet another big screen version of The Three Musketeers, and, for some reason...a sequel to Johnny English.