By David Germain
Movie fans slipped into Oblivion as the Tom Cruise sci-fi thriller led Hollywood with a $38.2m debut, according to studio estimates on Sunday.
That domestic haul comes on top of $33.7m Oblivion added in overseas markets, where the film began rolling out a week earlier. Oblivion raised its overseas total to $112m and its worldwide receipts to $150.2m.
Though many people on Friday were caught up in coverage of the manhunt for the suspect in the Boston Marathon explosions, it seems to have had little effect on how the film fared.
Oblivion took in $13.3m on opening day on Friday and $14.9m on Saturday. That 12 percent increase is not unusual for big new releases, which typically do better business on Saturday than Friday.
While Boston was on lockdown much of Friday, that market only accounts for about 1 percent of the nationwide box office, said Nikki Rocco, head of distribution for Universal, which released Oblivion. The manhunt mainly affected matinee business, with theatres reopening Friday night, when Dzhokhar Tsarnaev was taken into custody.
“Once the guy was arrested, I think people got back into their regular routine,” Rocco said.
The previous weekend’s top film, the Warner Bros. baseball drama 42, held up well, slipping to second-place with $18m in its second weekend. The Jackie Robinson biography starring Chadwick Boseman and Harrison Ford raised its domestic total to $54.1m and is on its way to the $100m mark, said Dan Fellman, Warner’s head of distribution.
Overseas, Paramount’s G.I. Joe: Retaliation got a lift with $40m, most of it coming from a $33m debut in China. The action sequel has topped $200m internationally and $300m worldwide.
Oblivion came in a bit higher than industry expectations. But despite its strong opening, Hollywood’s 2013 revenue funk continued, with overall domestic receipts at $109m, down 19.4 percent from the same weekend last year, according to box-office tracker Hollywood.com.
A year ago, two new romances — the comedy Think Like a Man and the drama The Lucky One — combined for $56m that weekend, while the blockbuster The Hunger Games remained strong with nearly $15m.
“Even Tom Cruise was unable to beat the strength of two really strong newcomers that were devoid of stars anywhere near in his league,” said Hollywood.com analyst Paul Dergarabedian. “That tells you the difference between last year and this year. Even when we have a good weekend like this in 2013, generally these weekends, they pale by comparison to what happened last year.”
Domestic revenues in 2013 total $2.76bn, down 11.2 percent from where business was at last year, when Hollywood took in record cash.
Business slumped a bit in summer 2012 with some high-profile duds, so studios have a shot at gaining ground over last year with this season’s upcoming blockbusters, which include Iron Man 3, Star Trek Into Darkness, ’The Hangover Part III and Man of Steel.
Still, the gap almost certainly will continue to rise in the early part of the summer season.
Disney’s Marvel Studios sequel Iron Man 3 is expected to open with a whopping $125m-plus domestically over the first weekend in May, Dergarabedian said. But that would fall far short of the record-breaking $207.4m debut for the Marvel ensemble smash The Avengers over the same weekend last year.
Even so, Cruise’s Oblivion provides a solid action lead-in to summer. The film stars Cruise as a repairman fixing machines in the wastelands of Earth after an alien attack.
Despite upheavals and odd behaviour in Cruise’s personal life in the last six or seven years, he remains one of Hollywood’s surest box-office draws. Universal reported that in exit polls, fans cited Cruise as the No. 1 reason they saw the film.
“He’s a global star,” Rocco said. “People love Tom Cruise. If you put him in the right vehicle, they love him even better.”
In narrower release, Rob Zombie’s latest horror tale The Lords of Salem flopped with $622,000 in 355 theatres, for a dismal average of $1,752 a cinema. That compared to an average of $10,085 in 3,783 theaters for Oblivion”
The low-budget hip-hop drama Filly Brown opened solidly with $1.4m in 188 theatres, for an average of $7,250. The film stars Gina Rodriguez and the late Jenni Rivera in the story of a young talent with a shot at stardom on Los Angeles’ hip-hop scene.
Estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at US and Canadian theatres, according to Hollywood.com. Where available, latest international numbers are also included.
1. Oblivion, $38.2m ($33.7m international).
2. 42, $18m.
3. The Croods, $9.5m ($23.4m).
4. Scary Movie 5, $6.3m ($3.5m).
5. G.I. Joe: Retaliation, $5.8m ($40m).
6. The Place Beyond the Pines, $4.7m.
7. Olympus Has Fallen, $4.5m ($7.8m).
8. Evil Dead, $4.1m ($2.3m).
9. Jurassic Park in 3-D, $4m ($420,000 international).
10. Oz the Great and Powerful, $3m ($1.5m).
AP
