Weekend Box Office: January 18-20

Courtesy of BoxOffice.com: 

1.  Mama - $28.1 million

2.  Zero Dark Thirty - $17.6 million

3.  Silver Linings Playbook - $11.3 million

4.  Gangster Squad - $9.1 million

5.  Broken City - $9 million

6.  A Haunted House - $8.3 million

7.  Django Unchained - $8.2 million

8.  Les Miserables - $7.8 million

9.  The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey - $6.4 million

10.  The Last Stand - $6.3 million

It was a good weekend for horror movies and Oscar hopefuls, but not so much for Arnold Schwarzenegger, as his big comeback, The Last Stand, turned out to be a box-office bust.  The movie barely managed to crack the top ten, landing (at least until the actuals are totalled up tomorrow) in tenth place, just behind The Hobbit, which has been in theaters for more than a month.  Yikes.

Meanwhile, moviegoers were seeing plenty of Academy Award nominee Jessica Chastain this weekend, as the horror film Mama easily took first place with a terrific $28.1 million, and Zero Dark Thirty was in second place $17.6 million - dropping only 28% from its first-place finish last weekend.  So even if Mama takes the inevitable horror movie dive from here, at least the movie Chastain was actually nominated for remains the more popular of the two films. 

Fellow Best Actress nominee (and this weekend's SNL host) Jennifer Lawrence also had a good weekend, with Silver Linings Playbook finally - it's been in theaters for 10 weeks, longer than any other movie in the top 10 - going into wide release and earning a solid $11.3 million.  Other Oscar nominees continue to do well, with Django Unchained officially becoming Quentin Tarantino's highest grossing film with $138.3 million, and Les Miserables boosting its own total to $130.3 million.  Overseas, the musical has grossed an additional $115 million.  And while it may have only scored nominations in the technical categories, The Hobbit still has $300 million in its sights as its total went up to $287 million after this weekend.

This weekend's other dud was Broken City, which flopped with only $9 million.  The delayed Gangster Squad continued to underperfom, having only earned $32 million through its second weekend.

Next weekend is not looking like much, with Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters (seriously?) opening in theaters, along with the comedy Movie 43.  Might be a good time to catch up on some of those Oscar movies, if you haven't already.