Friday Box Office Analysis
By Tim Briody
March 17, 2011
BoxOfficeProphets.com
Keeping the the spot warm for The Hunger Games next weekend, the movie version of the late '80s television series 21 Jump Street starts with a quite solid $13.1 million Friday. You could consider it a small upset that it performed so strongly on Friday, though it's not a Norfolk State or Lehigh-style shocker. Think of it more as a 12-5 upset. You knew it was coming, but might just be surprised at how easy they made it look. What's probably the more surprising thing about 21 Jump Street's opening night is the studio has already signed Jonah Hill (who co-wrote the script) to develop a sequel based on just one day of box office. It's still running up against an entire weekend of basketball, but if the most historic night NCAA tournament history didn't slow down 21 Jump Street's opening, not much will over Saturday and Sunday, especially thanks to the solid reviews and positive word-of-mouth. A weekend total of $37 million is an excellent start for the comedy.
The Lorax
After two weekends on top, The Lorax is bumped out by 21 Jump Street, but continues to show some excellent legs, with another $6.7 million on Friday, a mere 30.2% decline from last weekend. It's going to continue chugging along to $200 million, with a second place weekend finish with $27.1 million.
Casa de Mi Padre
Moving up a notch in the upset scale, limited release Casa de Mi Padre crashes a soft bottom half of the top ten with $760,000 in just 382 theaters. You might not know this, but it's a Spanish-language comedy that stars [bp:121_]Will Ferrell[/bp], and also has Mexican stars [bp:3690_]Gael Garcia Bernal[/bp] and Diego Luna, and is produced by Ferrell and long time collaborator Adam McKay. The Lionsgate-distributed film, which cost just $6 million to make, should come in with $2.4 million for the weekend.
Notable Holdovers
John Carter took in $4 million on Friday, down 59.1% from last Friday. With a supposed negative cost of $250 million, John Carter is not even going to take in $100 million domestically. Give it a second weekend of $12.4 million.