DreamWorks' green ogre proved to be tough enough to beat four new entries at the box office this week. For the third weekend in a row Shrek Forever After reigned at the top spot, securing another $25.3 million dollars over the weekend. This brings Shrek 4's total up to $183m, earning enough to recoup the studio's production investment. However, when you compare Shrek Forever After with Shrek the Third, the former sequel is well-off of the latter; at this time Shrek 3 had $255m domestic in its coffers. It goes to show you that a weak third movie can still effect the box office for a stronger fourth film in the franchise.
In second spot was Universal's Get Him to the Greek, a new comedy produced by Superbad's Judd Apatow and starring Jonah Hill in the leading man slot. $17.4 is a nice haul for this $40 million dollar-budgeted R-rated laffer. It worked for Warner Bros. last summer with The Hangover, right?
Killers debuted in third spot with $16.1 mil, becoming the new Date Night and giving the agents repping Ashton Kutcher and Katherine Heigl an opportunity to breathe a sigh of relief.
Prince of Persia is in fourth place ($13.9m new, $59.4 total) and will get nowhere close to its repoted $200 million dollar price tag. Sex and the City 2 drops three spots to #5 ($12.6 new, $73.4 total) and 20th Century Fox's latest talking animal flick, Marmaduke, debuts in sixth place with $11.3 million and the disgust of the online movie webmaster community. Eww!
In its fifth week is Iron Man 2 nestled in spot #7 ($7.7 new, $291.2m total) while Warner Bros. sci-fi/horror Splice couldn't evolve any further than eighth spot in its inaugural weekend ($7.4m total there.) Ridley Scott's Robin Hood is dropping fast ($5.1m new, $94.2m total) and Letters to Juliet is bringing up the rear at #10 ($3.0m new, $43.3m total).
All in all it's one of the weaker June openings of all-time. You'd have to look back 13 years to 1997 to see the same kind of total box office tallies as our 2010 results. Is it weather, the economy or a lack of viewer interest for the offerings? Anyone care to offer their explanation?
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WarCry
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Posted: 12 years 51 weeks ago
I think the answer is the lack of tentpoles so far. Iron Man is really the on big, hot release. Shrek is close, but it's the fourth movie. I think the new-car smell has worn of that one.
A-Team is coming up, The Last Airbender in July, but what else is there? Toy Story 3 will draw big numbers being a Pixar flick, but I think it will have the same "burnt out" factor as Shrek. Oh, of course the 3rd Twilight will be big. That one has a built in factor driving it.
All the other movies I'm excited for - Predators, The Expendables, Knight & Day, they're all pretty hit and miss. They'll either be huge, or they'll crash hard and die painful deaths.
We won't really know, though, until the end of the summer. But by that time, we'll all be moving on to the new Harry Potter, the sequel to Tron, and the remake of Red Dawn (which I still think will be great). I guess we'll just have to wait and see.....