One can only imagine what scorchingly candid observations Universal boss Ron Meyer will soon make about his studio’s Tower Heist , which is currently more than 30 percent off the pace originally projected for its opening-weekend grosses. America wasn’t racing to the latest Harold & Kumar film either, choosing instead a family-friendlier 3-D confection that may yet emerge at the top of the box-office charts. Your Friday Box Office is here.
Temperatures plunged this weekend — but enough about the box-office heat foreseen for this week’s new openings and even a few holdovers. Grab a snow shovel and let’s get to digging ourselves out of the icy trap also known as Weekend Receipts.
Barring a Texas Rangers-esque collapse today and tomorrow, America’s favorite spun-off Spanish feline with a sword will scamper away with the weekend’s box-office crown: Puss in Boots easily knocked off Paranormal Activity 3 , which slid some 70 percent off last Friday’s blistering pace. In other news, Justin Timberlake and Johnny Depp opened soft and Anonymous had a Bard time (sorry) on around 250 screens. Your Friday Box Office is here.
Who’da thunk it? As much as most of us probably laughed when we heard that a “Paranormal Activity 3″ was coming to a theater near us, thousands spent their money to check it out this weekend, making it a record-breaking film. Paramount’s threequel/prequel will have to settle with merely being the second- biggest horror debut ever, the eighth-biggest R-rated opening, and the top October launch. Tragic, I know. The $5 million film grossed a massive $54 million this weekend, which is a 35% jump from Paranormal Activity 2′s $40.6 million opening this time last year. The film had a massively front loaded weekend, the ninth-biggest on record, with a mere 2.06x weekend multiplier. Still, that was better than the 2.01x weekend multiplier for Paranormal Activity 2 last year (the sixth-smallest such multiplier). The picture played 53% under-25 and 54% female. Considering the film pulled just in $1.7 million more at midnight, the $26 million opening day (around $6 million more than Paranormal Activity 2′s $20.6 million Friday) and $14 million jump in total opening weekend compared to the last film, there is a clear growth in this series. Which probably means there will be a “Paranormal Activity 4″… The first film opened very slowly, with massive per-screen averages leading up to a pre-Halloween wide release that grossed $21 million against the opening weekend of the comparatively under performing Saw VI ($14 million). Paranormal Activity ended up with $109 million, while the sequel opened with a massive $40 million weekend but ended with just $84 million (a meager 2.1x weekend-to-final gross multiplier). Even if the third picture manages equally poor legs, it will still end up with $113 million. Whether or not the series has peaked with the third installment like Saw III, this uber-cheap franchise has been a licence to print money for the last three years and should continue to be so for the next few Halloweens. Paramount has scored a studio’s dream – blockbuster grosses on a franchise with minuscule costs. It’s already done $26 million worldwide, giving the film a massive (for a cheap horror film) $80 million worldwide debut. Come what may, they will be milking this series until the audience stops caring. Did you catch “Paranormal Activity 3″ this weekend? If not, does the movie’s opening weekend success make you wanna see it now? Source
The past month’s been slow at the cineplex, but you can thank Paranormal Activity 3 for giving the people what they want: graininess! The second sequel trounces everything in its path this week, especially other newcomers like The Three Musketeers and Johnny English Reborn . The tally follows.
My complicated muddle of feelings toward the Paranormal Activity franchise are directly related to my acute personal susceptibility to jump scares. They work on me embarrassingly well. A film that’s as reliant on them on Paranormal Activity 3 , the series’ latest episode, can have me as twitchy as an meth addict out of agonized anticipation of the inevitable “boo.”
Fantastic Fest wrapped up last night in Austin, and after a full week of cramming our eyeballs full of movies 12 hours a day, we’re pooped. The last few days of the fest still held some surprises, like the premiere of Paranormal Activity 3 at a much-hyped midnight secret screening (though House of the Devil director Ti West gave PA3 a serious run for its ghost-story money with The Innkeepers , starring Sara Paxton , the following night). Closing night also saw the world premiere of the documentary Comic-Con, Episode 4: A Fan’s Hope , spiced up by a cavalcade of spandex-clad cosplay girls. More after the jump!
Just because you’re not receiving mysterious VHS tapes in Austin this week — where rumor has it Paramount may premiere Paranormal Activity 3 tonight as a secret screening at Fantastic Fest — does not mean that you won’t get to see the franchise prequel before its October 21 release. The studio has just launched a Twitter campaign which allows fans to vote on 20 cities to host special pre-release premieres. And if that still isn’t soon enough for you Paranormal fans out there, Paramount has just released a majorly spoiler-filled new trailer for the film from Catfish directors Henry Joost and Ariel Schulman. Click ahead at your own discretion.
Today at Fantastic Fest , Movieline got its hands on a VHS tape labeled “September 1988,” packaged in an unmarked manila envelope. Perhaps (probably) not coincidentally, the date corresponds to recently released footage from Paranormal Activity 3 , the forthcoming found footage prequel about spooky goings-on in the lives of a family haunted by unseen forces. Could this have something to do with tomorrow’s hotly anticipated secret screening?
