THE BOX OFFICE REPORT: SEPTEMBER 16

I took last week off because the general public took off last week from visiting movie theaters everywhere as the number one film (holdover The Possession) didn’t even cross the $10 million mark. But people started hitting the theater a bit more this past weekend, thanks to a video game franchise and a re-release of an animated film in 3D. Can it just be next weekend already?

1. Resident Evil Retribution – $21.1 (first week)

Milla Jovovich continues to be at least a B-list star as a D-list franchise continues to be profitable. The films have all finished well in the red (most notably the 4th film which had a worldwide gross of $296 million up against a $60 million budget) and after this one finishes up, the series might have grossed upwards of $800 million against no more than $300 million for budgets. This a widely panned series (34% is the highest Rotten Tomatoes score between the five films – and that’s for the first one) that has a built in audience thanks to the success and love for the video game franchise. It would be hard to believe that this will be the last time we see Jovovich’s Alice take on the Umbrella Corporation.

2. Finding Nemo 3D -$17.5 (first week of re-release, $357.2 million total)

Everyone’s favorite lost fish film (is that specific enough) got a Pixar re-release in 3D and it was able to gain a nice chunk of change out of it. It was lower than the re-releases of both Lion King and Beauty and the Beast although it was right along the level of the latter. I think this is about right for a film like this, one where all the viewers of it probably own it and have re-watched it countless times, but just wanted to check it back out in the new dimension. It’s just such a cash grab that it bugs me, but hey, if you can top almost everything that’s out right now in doing so, then good on you, Pixar.

3. Possession – $5.8 ($41.2 total)

The two-time champ finally fell to #3 but it certainly took the cake for awful-looking horror movies at the box office this year, turning a small budget ($14 million) into a fairly nice return. It must have been the power of Jeffrey Dean Morgan…

4. Lawless -$4.2 ($30.1 total)

I’m a bit surprised by it’s low take, but I guess I haven’t gotten out to see it yet either, so I can’t be too hard on the American people. Still, I’ve heard mostly good things (and it’s got a 65% on Rotten Tomatoes) so I know I’ll be checking it out at some point but that point is looking more and more like it will be at home in a few months when it’s on DVD.

5. ParaNorman – $3.0 ($49.3 total)

The animated film is going to edge out The Odd Life of Timothy Green and the Diary of a Wimpy Kid sequel for highest late-summer Box Office champ. Congrats. Now, if only you could have competed with the other animated films…

6. Expendables 2 – $3.0 ($80.3 total)

Definitely not gonna make it to the century mark. Too bad. Such a great action flick.

7. The Words – $2.9 ($9.2 total)

There are no words. (See what I did there?)

8. The Bourne Legacy -$2.9 ($107.8 total)

I still hate that this made more than The Expendables 2. In fact, I might just go back and take a half of a heart away from my review just to spite the filmmakers for giving such a bummed out version of a Bourne film. Do you think Dylan or Kai would mind?

9. The Odd Life of Timothy Green – $2.5 ($46.3 total)

It’s hard to hate on $50 million for a film about a kid that literally comes out of a garden. Also, Common is in this. Weird.

10. The Campaign – $2.4 ($82.9 total)

Petering out. Chalk this one up with most of the other Ferrell movies that we will forget in about 5 years.

11. The Dark Knight Rises – $2.1 ($441.0 total)

Mentioning this just to say that it is now the 9th highest grossing film all-time worldwide and (thankfully) about to pass Shrek 2 to become the 7th highest film all-time domestically. I love this movie. I love this trilogy. I love Batman. It’s true.

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Next week sees the release of a ton of movies, all of which interest me on some level. First there’s the Clint Eastwood baseball pic Trouble with the Curve, which is getting great reviews, most likely due to the fact that Clint is acting against real live humans and not chairs or invisible Presidents. Then there’s House at the End of the Street, which doesn’t look amazing but Jennifer Lawrence always puts in a nice effort so it will be interesting to see how she handles the horror genre (plus, I’ll be attending a press screening for it on Thursday so I don’t really have a choice on that one!). Then there’s End of Watch, the gritty cop drama from David Ayer, the writer of quite a few films including Training Day, one of my All-Time Top 5. But my number 1 film for this weekend is Dredd 3D (here’s hoping I can catch it without the goofy glasses somewhere) which already has a 90% on Rotten Tomatoes and looks like a ton of campy fun, gratuitous violence, and Karl Urban just being awesome. Count me in!

Until next week!