Weekend Box Office: Shortage of Tween Girls and Middle-Aged Gamers Help 'Madea' Win Again

It would be a shame if the stinging loss the Jonas Brothers suffered at the hands of fellow Disney Channel pop superstar Hannah Montana doesn't give those nice-looking boys an inferiority complex. Still, it's hard not to note how the $12 million debut for Jonas Brothers: The 3D Concert Experience compares to Hannah Montana/Miley Cyrus: The Best of Both Worlds Tour's $31 million bow. Adding insult to injury, Hannah Montana managed the feat on just under 700 screens, while les freres Jonas had 1,300 to work with. I'm not too up on the trends in tween girl entertainment, so I invite analysis in the comments. I thought the Jonas Brothers were nearly as much of a sensation as Hannah/Miley.

The Jonases did kick the crap out of the aging, ailing Street Fighter franchise, the latest installment of which opened to a powerful $4.65 million (albeit on around 1200 screens). The best part is that, though Fox declined to screen the film for the press (junketeers excepted, natch), it scheduled midnight shows for the film around the country. I was required to attend last Thursday night, and I was one of five people in the theater. Interest in the film may have been wildly overestimated.

The whiffs from Jonas and Street Fighter (relative from Jonas; absolute from Street Fighter) allowed Tyler Perry's Madea Goes to Jail another week atop the box office, despite the hefty 60% second weekend drop typical of the Perry franchise. With a total gross of nearly $65 million, Madea Goes to Jail is already the most lucrative Tyler Perry movie ever.



Slumdog Millionare, fresh off its Best Picture win and in its 16th week of release, expanded to nearly 3000 screens and rose to a best-yet #3 at the box office; it's grossed $115 million, though now we can probably expect it to start slowing down at last. The terrific Taken, which fell a mere 11% in its fifth week of release, is starting to look like a genuine sleeper smash. And I'm happy to see that the seriously underrated Fired Up! actually held up sort of okay after its middling 9th place debut last week, dropping 30% and sticking around the top 10.

1 - Tyler Perry's Madea Goes to Jail (Lionsgate) - $40.12 ($20,236) - $40.12
2 - Jonas Brothers: The 3D Concert Experience (Disney) - $12.70 ($9,992) - $12.70
3 - Slumdog Millionaire (Fox Searchlight) - $12.15 ($4,128) - $115.15
4 - Taken (Fox) - $9.95 ($3,221) - $107.88
5 - He's Just Not That Into You (New Line) - $5.88 ($2,056) - $78.53
6 - Paul Blart: Mall Cop (Sony) - $5.60 ($2,076) - $128.11
7 - Coraline (Focus) - $5.25 ($2,546) - $61.15
8 - Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li - $4.65 ($4,093) - $4.65
9 - Confessions of a Shopaholic (Buena Vista) - $4.49 ($1,772) - $33.66
10 - Fired Up (Screen Gems) - $3.80 ($2,098) - $10.14

Next week: Watchmen! Anyone want to venture an opening weekend guess? I feel like being tapped into the geek community distorts my perspective on this. I'm going with $55 million.