Hathaway/Hudson Spanked By Eastwood At Box Office

[comedyfreak]

Anne Hathaway and Kate Hudson together don't add up to one Clint Eastwood.

The 78-year-old Mount Rushmore of movie stars schooled the twentysomethings at the box office, with Eastwood's Gran Torino taking the weekend with a studly $29 million, per studio estimates compiled today by Exhibitor Relations.

Hathaway and Hudson's much-hyped Bride Wars took second ($21.5 million), but struggled to match its magazine-cover output with bottoms in seats.

The comedy was outgrossed, theater for theater, by three Top 10 films: Gran Torino; the new horror film, The Unborn ($21.1 million); and, the new Fireproof-y drama, Not Easily Broken, which made a Fireproof-y $5.6 million off only 724 screens.

Drilling down into the numbers, including just maybe the saddest stat yet for The Spirit:

• Bride Wars played at about 500 more theaters than Gran Torino, nearly 1,000 more than The Unborn and about 2,500 more than Not Easily Broken. • Bride Wars compares favorably to Katherine Heigl's 27 Dresses, which debuted last January with $23 million—albeit on the strength of far better reviews, and without the benefit of about 200 additional theaters. • This was not Gran Torino's opening weekend. This was its fifth weekend. (It was its first in wide release.) • In addition to Hathaway and Hudson, Eastwood beat Brad Pitt (The Curious Case of Benjamin Button), Adam Sandler (Bedtime Stories), Tom Cruise (Valkyrie), Will Smith (Seven Pounds) and the guy with the scythe from The Seventh Seal. • Eastwood's first Eastwood film since Million Dollar Baby, Gran Torino has grossed $40.1 million overall. Its typically efficient director reportedly only spent $25 million to produce the Oscar hopeful. • Not Easily Broken's opening weekend surpassed its reported budget of $5 million. • After four weekends, The Tale of Despereaux ($2.6 million) isn't within $10 million of its reported $60 million budget. • After five weekends, The Day the Earth Stood Still is still about $3 million shy of matching its modest (for a high-profile sci-fi film) $80 million budget. • After a two-weekend run at No. 1, Marley & Me ($11.4 million) slipped to fourth, but hit $123.7 million overall. • Pitt's Benjamin Button is doing what Oscar contenders rarely do these days: close in on $100 million before nominations are announced. As of today, Button's cumulative take stands at $94.3 million. • Mickey Rourke's The Wrestler ($873,898 at 60 theaters) continued to star in limited release. Defiance ($66,000 at two theaters) did even better. • Twilight ($2.8 million) surpassed the $180 million mark overall. • From Friday-Sunday, the broken-down Spirit sold about 24 tickets a day at each of its theaters. • The above stat brought to you by highly speculative movie math: take the weekend per-screen average ($515) divide by three, and then divide by the average ticket price ($7.20).

Weekend Box Office Estimates (U.S.)
This Wk Last Wk Title Dist. Weekend Gross Cumulative
Gross Rlse
Wks # of
Theaters
1 14 Gran Torino Warner Bros. Pictures Distribution $29,025,000 $40,065,000 5 2808
2 - Bride Wars 20th Century Fox Distribution $21,500,000 $21,500,000 1 3226
4 1 Marley & Me 20th Century Fox Distribution $11,350,000 $123,710,000 3 3478
5 3 The Curious Case of Benjamin Button Paramount Pictures $9,450,000 $94,330,000 3 2947
6 2 Bedtime Stories Buena Vista Pictures Distribution $8,550,000 $97,180,000 3 3511
7 4 Valkyrie MGM Distribution Company $6,662,000 $71,509,000 3 2838
8 5 Yes Man Warner Bros. Pictures Distribution $6,155,000 $89,410,000 4 2955
9 - Not Easily Broken Sony Pictures Releasing $5,600,000 $5,600,000 1 724
10 6 Seven Pounds Sony Pictures Releasing $3,900,000 $66,830,000 4 2456
11 10 Slumdog Millionaire Fox Searchlight Pictures $3,730,000 $34,075,000 9 601
12 11 Twilight Summit Entertainment, LLC, Paramount Pictures $2,789,000 $181,396,000 8 1466

[catlover79]

Somehow I'm not surprised. Gran Torino actually looks pretty interesting. God bless Clint Eastwood - he still makes interesting and thought-provoking movies. He shows no signs of slowing down.

[browneyes106]

I haven't seen Gran Torino but my boyfriend said it is very good.

[comedyfreak]

Originally Posted by catlover79

Somehow I'm not surprised. Gran Torino actually looks pretty interesting. God bless Clint Eastwood - he still makes interesting and thought-provoking movies. He shows no signs of slowing down.

Definately one of his best. I'm surprised that no one was offended by his characters racist remarks though. Any other race and people would be up in arms about the whole thing.