"The Possession" Leads The Labor Day Weekend Box Office

[JamesG]

Weekend Report: The Possession Leads Typically Quiet Labor Day
by Ray Subers
September 2, 2012


As usual, audiences largely stayed away from movie theaters over Labor Day weekend. Still, supernatural thriller The Possession easily took first place with one of the best debuts ever for the holiday.

Lawless was a distant second, while Oogieloves In The BIG Balloon Adventure registered one of the worst nationwide openings ever.

For the three-day weekend the Top 12 earned an estimated $83.7 million, which is roughly on par with last Labor Day weekend.





The Possession scared up an estimated $17.7 million from 2,816 locations in its first three days in theaters. That's a bit off from recent Lionsgate supernatural horror movies The Last Exorcism ($23 million) and The Haunting in Connecticut ($23 million).

Still, for Labor Day weekend this is a very strong start: in fact, the movie's estimated $21.3 million four-day haul would be good for second place all-time among Labor Day openers behind the 2007 Halloween remake ($30.6 million).





Lawless took second place with an estimated $9.67 million over the three-day weekend. That brings its five-day total to $11.8 million, which is identical to Labor Day 2011's The Debt but way behind Labor Day 2010's The American ($16.3 million).

With a stacked cast that includes Shia LaBeouf and Tom Hardy, it's understandable that some people expected more from this, though it was always going to be held back by its period setting, thick accents, and bland visual palette.





The Expendables 2 fell 34 percent to an estimated $8.8 million, which brought its total to $66.2 million.

It currently trails the original movie by nearly $16 million.





The Bourne Legacy eased a light 22 percent to $7.2 million, which was good for fourth place. The movie has now earned $96.2 million, and will pass $100 million by the end of the week.

It does still look like reaching The Bourne Identity's $121.7 million is going to be tough, which has to be a disappointment for Universal Pictures.





ParaNorman rounded out the Top Five with an estimated $6.55 million (down just 24 percent from last weekend).

The movie has now grossed a total of $38 million, which is about $25 million less than Coraline had made through the same point.





Falling just 15 percent to $6.06 million, The Odd Life of Timothy Green had the best hold among nationwide releases this weekend.

The movie has now earned $35.9 million through three weekends in theaters.





The Dark Knight Rises also had a great hold, dipping 19 percent to an estimated $5.9 million.

The conclusion to Christopher Nolan's Batman trilogy is now at $431.2 million total, and it's poised to move up to eighth place on the all-time domestic chart by next weekend.





2016 Obama's America expanded to 1,747 locations (up from 1,091 last weekend) but still fell 22 percent to an estimated $5.1 million. That 51 percent drop in per-theater average (from $5,966 to $2,921) seems steep, but it's pretty normal for a divisive political documentary.

For example, Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 9/11 fell 66 percent in second weekend per-theater average.

2016 Obama's America has now earned $18.2 million, and is on pace to ultimately pass Bowling for Columbine ($21.6 million), An Inconvenient Truth ($24.1 million) and Sicko ($24.5 million) to become the second highest-grossing political documentary ever.





It was pretty obvious that Oogieloves in the BIG Balloon Adventure wasn't going to do well, but no one expected it to open this low. The movie earned an estimated $448,000 from 2,160 locations this weekend; that tops 2008's Delgo ($511,920) for the worst debut ever for a movie in more than 2,000 theaters.

It also had the second-worst per-theater average for a movie in nationwide release at just $207.

To put that in perspective, if each location played Oogieloves five times a day on one screen at an average ticket price of $7, that would translate to fewer than two people per showing.

http://www.boxofficemojo.com/news/?id=3513&p=.htm







August 31-September 2, 2012 Weekend Studio Estimates:


1. The Possession $17,725,000
2. Lawless $9,674,000
3. The Expendables 2 $8,800,000 / $66,159,000
4. The Bourne Legacy $7,248,000 / $96,247,000
5. ParaNorman $6,551,000 / $38,025,000
6. The Odd Life of Timothy Green $6,055,000 / $35,900,000
7. The Dark Knight Rises $5,880,000 / $431,196,000
8. The Campaign $5,445,000 / $73,022,000
9. 2016 Obama's America $5,103,000 / $18,203,000
10. Hope Springs $4,700,000 / $52,057,000