h4Weekend Box Office
1) Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs - $24.6 million
2) Surrogates - $15 million
3) Fame - $10.03 million
4) The Informant! - $6.9 million
5) Tyler Perry's I Can Do Bad All by Myself - $4.7
6) Pandorum - $4.4 million
7) Love Happens - $4.3 million
8) Jennifer's Body - $3.5 million
9) 9 - $2.8 million
10) Inglourious Basterds - $2.7 million
Not even human-like robots or dancing teens could stop last week's animated winner from repeating this week. Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs held the top spot for the second week in a row, taking in an estimated $24.6 million in its second week in release. The film still had the widest release of the weekend (3,119 theaters), but the repeat was made even more impressive since the film only dropped a phenomenal 18.8% from its debut weekend.
A crop of three new releases challenged the Sony animated hit, two of which faring well, but neither film came close to Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs. Surrogates took second place with an estimated $15 million gross and the 80s remake Fame came in third with an estimated $10.03 million. Both films received solid rollouts, with Surrogates opening in 2,951 theaters and Fame opening in 3,096 theaters. Surrogates made the most of its release with a solid $5,083 per-screen average while Fame could only manage a $3,241 per-screen average. The weekend's other new film in wide release fared far worse, with Pandorum taking sixth place with $4.4 million. The film was released in 2,506 theaters but put up a dismal $1,759 per-screen average.
There were a few films that made some noise in limited release this weekend, led by America's most controversial documentarian. Michael Moore's new film Capitalism: A Love Story took in $240,000 over the weekend and $307,000 since its Wednesday release. The film only opened in four theaters for its limited opening, before its wide release on October 2, for an incredible $60,000 per-screen average. It will be quite interesting to see how this film fares once it hits nationwide. Coco Before Chanel also fared well with a $177,000 gross from 5 theaters for a whopping $35,400 per-screen average and Brief Interviews with Hideous Men only opened in one theater but posted a healthy $20,600 from that sole theater. Not faring so well, however, was the Tucker Max adaptation I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell, which took in $369,000 from 120 theaters with a well-below-average $3,075 per-screen average.
Next weekend is rather crowded at the box office with three new films in wide release along with two animated classics coming to 3-D, Michael Moore's documentary expanding and the new Coen Brothers film hitting in limited release. Zombieland leads the way with the biggest release followed by Drew Barrymore's directorial debut Whip It! and the new Ricky Gervais comedy The Invention of Lying. Toy Story and Toy Story 2 will also be hitting theaters in new Disney 3-D presentations while the documentary Capitalism: A Love Story will expand to a national release and the new Coen Brothers film, A Serious Man opens in limited release. Check back here next Sunday to see what film comes out on top in this highly-competitive weekend.