Friday Box Office Analysis
By Tim Briody
June 18, 2011
BoxOfficeProphets.com
It's an $21.6 million (including $3.4 million in midnight showings) Friday for Green Lantern, which is neither brightest day nor blackest night. It is on the lower end of the comic book film earnings spectrum, but it's not a complete disaster (though we might call it that when we see its decline next weekend). Earning terrible reviews and generally looking kind of silly don't help matters much, so what amounts to a best case scenario for Green Lantern is a weekend of $51.2 million.
[tm:5088_]Mr. Popper's Penguins[/tm]
Oh, [bp:1155_]Jim Carrey[/bp]. Mr. Popper's Penguins, based on yet another children's book I'd never heard of (although one published in 1938 instead of this century), earned $6.4 million on Friday. I think we can chalk up the bulk of that to the remnants of Carrey's box office drawing power, which he's now squandered the remains of. That said, this will probably play to the kiddies and families, who have not had much to see lately. Look for a weekend of $18.8 million.
Notable Holdovers
[tm:5049_]Super 8[/tm] holds well enough, down 52% from last Friday to $5.9 million, meaning it's going to have an overall weekend decline under 50%, which is a big victory for the J.J. Abrams film. It managed a 2.91 multiplier last weekend, and word-of-mouth is generally pretty positive (unless you hate lens flare), but it's not like this is another Sixth Sense (or even [tm:5170_]Bridesmaids[/tm]). Look for a second weekend of $19.2 million.