Corona | Coming Attractions

Even with lackluster reviews from film critics weighing it down, Disney's Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides still managed to ride high to a first place showing at the box office.

Playing at 4,133 screens, Pirates 4 opened to the tune of $90.1 million dollars domestically. Factor in the additional $256 million that the movie has earned overseas and the minions at Disney have nothing to be sad about. However, if you compare On Stranger Tides' opening to the last two Pirates films, Dead Man's Chest ($135m opening weekend) and At World's End ($114m), then you'd see that things are lower this time around for Captain Jack Sparrow. This is a mega-picture, with a mega-sized budget (somewhere between $230m to $270m), and nothing short of $450 million dollars in worldwide grosses is going to come close to earning Disney a profit.

Ah, to have such problems.

One studio not having a problem right now is Universal Pictures. Why? Because Bridesmaids, it's modestly budgeted comedy, tumbled only 20% in its second weekend gross. Most movies fall between 50-60% in their second weekend. Bridesmaids deserves it, and buoyed by strong word of mouth, it's also earning good mid-week sums every night. With this weekend's $21 million dollars in ticket sales, Bridesmaids now stands at $59.5m in 10 short days. $100 million won't be a problem.

Paramount's mighty Thor is three weeks into its theatrical lifespan. Those comic book fans that have seen it say that it's OK but not a repeater. That seems to be playing out in Thor's third week grosses, with the monies earned dipping 55% down to $15.5m this week (for a cumulative gross of $145m.)

Back to Universal and movie #4 at the box office this weekend, that romantic comedy called Fast Five. It's romantic because Paul Walker and Vin Diesel have great chemistry together on-screen and it's a comedy because The Rock is in it. Week four brings Fast Five an additional $10.6 mil to push its domestic tally up to $186.2m.

Rio, Fox's CG toon, earns an additional $4.6m to come in fifth place (total: $131.6m).

Priest, Screen Gems' second horror franchise to try and convince us that Paul Bettany is an action hero, is in sixth place ($4.6m new, $23.6m total.)

Jumping the Broom is in seventh place ($3.7m new, $31.3m total), Something Borrowed is in eighth place ($3.4m new, $31.4m total) and Water for Elephants is in ninth ($2.1m new, $52.4m total.) And in tenth spot, Madea's Big Happy Family ($990k new, $51.7m total).