Weekend Wrap-Up

Always Darkest before the Dawn of the Planet of the Apes

By David Mumpower

July 13, 2014

The state of ape education is puts them well ahead of the United States.

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Deliver Us from Evil, the Eric Bana horror film, is our seventh place film. With $4.7 million for the weekend, the Screen Gems production had a worst-in-the-top-10 decline of 52%, and now has increased its domestic take to $25 million. It has accrued nearly $5 million overseas, but with a fairly bloated $30 million budget for a horror flick, it’s going to hover right on the edge of profitability.

Eighth goes to Maleficent, one of the leggiest films of the summer. The Walt Disney/Angelina Jolie fairy tale reimagining earned $4.2 million, down 32% from last weekend. The studio has to be thrilled with Maleficent’s trajectory this summer, as it has accrued $222 million from domestic venues and nearly $450 million from overseas theaters.

Our next film is one that the Weinstein Company is expanding from limited release. Begin Again, a small project from Once director John Carney, earned $2.9 million as its venue count jumped from 175 last weekend to 939 this frame. With a terrific cast that includes Keira Knightley, Mark Ruffalo, Hailee Steinfeld, Catherine Keener and Mos Def, the film is 80% fresh at Rotten Tomatoes, though Top Critics are admittedly slightly less enamored of the project as their rating comes in at 66%. The film’s current domestic total is $5.2 million, and it will hope to occupy the same spot that Chef did for a good run earlier this summer.




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Closing out the top 10 is Jersey Boys, the musical miss from director Clint Eastwood. It fell 51% to $2.5 million, which brings its domestic total to $41.7 million. So far, there hasn’t been much interest generated overseas as the international venues have reported about $7 million in revenue. The budget on this one was $40 million, so it’s going to struggle to return much revenue for Warner Bros.

If we compare this year's top 12 to the same weekend last year, the combined films of 2014 earned $139.7 million, a big decline of from the $190.9 million of 2013. Last year, not only was Despicable Me 2 continuing its remarkable run, but Grown Ups 2 and Pacific Rim both debuted with more than $35 million apiece. Next weekend brings an interesting trifecta of new releases, including Planes: Fire and Rescue, a sequel to Disney's sellout of Pixar's Cars franchise, The Purge: Anarchy, a follow-up to the surprise horror hit from last year, and Sex Tape, a comedy that reunites the stars and director of Bad Teacher.


Top Ten for Weekend of
Rank
Film
Distributor
Estimated
Gross
Weekly Change
Running Total
1 Dawn of the Planet of the Apes 20th Century Fox 73.0 New 73.0
2 Transformers: Age of Extinction Paramount 16.5 -55% 209.0
3 Tammy Warner Bros. 12.9 -40% 57.4
4 22 Jump Street Sony 6.7 -32% 172.0
5 How to Train Your Dragon 2 Fox 5.9 -35% 152.1
6 Earth to Echo Relativity 5.5 -34% 24.6
7 Deliver Us from Evil Screen Gems 4.7 -52% 25.0
8 Maleficent Disney 4.2 -32% 222.0
9 Begin Again Weinstein Co. 2.9 +134% 5.3
10 Jersey Boys Warner Bros. 2.5 -51% 41.7
11 Think Like a Man Too Screen Gems 2.5 -49% 61.9
12 America Lionsgate 2.4 -11% 8.3

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