Weekend Box Office: Let's See What This Mr. Potter Can Do
Filed under: New Releases, Box Office
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince is only the second Harry Potter film to open on a Wednesday, after 2007's Order of the Phoenix. By the Sunday of its opening weekend, Order of the Phoenix was looking at a pretty impressive $140 million, on its way to being the year's 5th highest grosser, and a solid #2 in the franchise. By the Sunday of its opening weekend, Half-Blood Prince has $160 million in its coffers, as well as a slew of rapturous reviews and positive fan responses. (Well, mostly. There will always be whining from Rowling purists who don't know what an adaptation is.)That raises a real possibility that Half-Blood Prince could dethrone current domestic franchise king Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, which holds the top spot with $317 million. At the very least, it looks like it might be the only movie other than Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen to break the $300 million mark in 2009. (Transformers itself is already at $363 million -- #13 of all time! Christ!* -- and is looking unbeatable.)
Brüno took the tumble that its front-loaded opening weekend suggested (it made more than half its first weekend gross on the Friday of its release), dropping over 70% to fourth place. It will end up with around half of Borat's $129 million final number. The other summer comedies in circulation, The Hangover and The Proposal continue to hold up very well, with the former boosting from #6 to #5 in its seventh week of release.
(500) Days of Summer, opening on 27 screens in advance of a steady expansion in the coming weeks, got off to a promising 12th place start with a per-screen average over $30K.
The full top 12 after the jump.
1 - Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (Warner Bros.) - $79.48 ($18,376) - $159.66
2 - Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs (Fox) - $17.70 ($4,637) - $152.01
3 - Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (Paramount/Dreamworks) - $13.75 ($3,565) - $363.87
4 - Brüno (Universal) - $8.37 ($3,035) - $49.59
5 - The Hangover (Warner Bros.) - $8.32 ($3,118) - $235.88
6 - The Proposal (Disney) - $8,29 ($2,726) - $128.09
7 - Public Enemies (Universal) - $7.59 ($3,435) - $79.48
8 - Up (Disney) - $3.15 ($1,845) - $279.56
9 - My Sister's Keeper (Warner Bros.) - $2.83 ($1,436) - $41.50
10 - I Love You, Beth Cooper (Fox) - $2.67 ($1,424) - $10.26
11 - The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3 (Sony) - $0.89 ($1,451) - $62.90
12 - (500) Days of Summer (Fox Searchlight) - $0.84 ($31,937) - $0.84
Next week: the military-gerbil comedy G-Force, the apparently-terrible The Ugly Truth, and the apparently-not-bad Orphan. In other words, another weekend atop the pack for The Half-Blood Prince.
This post's somewhat weird title comes from a tweet by Cinematical overlord Erik Davis, who recently remarked that no one in the Harry Potter films or novels has ever delivered that line, and that someone really should before it's too late.
*Currently #12 but hanging there by a thread.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
7-20-2009 @ 9:36AM
Eric H said...
"Well, mostly. There will always be whining from Rowling purists who don't know what an adaptation is."
Its comments like this that remind me how pompous and stupid most film reviewers are. I honestly don't understand why I keep coming back to this site.
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7-20-2009 @ 11:30AM
Drewbacca said...
I have to agree (in a bit more polite way) with Eric H.
I don't believe someone is a "purist" because they get upset when a screenwriter/director removes key points of the book (IE: the search for the Half Blood Prince, the ending battle, etc...) for the film.
While I did enjoy the movie, I think they just got sloppy towards the end.
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7-21-2009 @ 8:22AM
Seher said...
the Half Blood Prince focused on idiotic pre adolescent futile love lifes. that IS a part of the story (it's importance is undeniable). But appart from the evolution of characters' relation, there is the real story which has been kind of left out...
it's not a bad movie, but it certainely doesn't carry the tension and the pressure of the original book.
I think thats the harry potter that sells: good movie, bad adaptation (thats what our screwed up generation will like and buy).
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7-21-2009 @ 8:23AM
Mangorilla said...
I consider myself a Harry Potter fan, but by no means a "Rowling purist." The epilogue of "The Deathly Hallows" read like it was written by a 13 year old fangirl. And Harry and Ginny's romance always felt forced and wrong to me, like Mrs. Rowling couldn't decide if Ron and Hermione, or Harry and Hermione should get together, and when she made her choice finally, she just threw Ginny in there to give Harry someone to be with, since she realized that the Cho charater was boring and one dimensional. I do know what an adaptation is. I'm not sure the screenwriter for The Half-Blood Prince still does, however. Seems to me the movie was full of fan pleasing small details, and not enough of the main plot. Do we need 20 minutes of Ron playing Quidditch, or do we need to explore who and what the Half-Blood Prince is? Do we need to be spoon-fed the "drama" of Ron and hermione's budding romance, or can we figure that out for ourselves, and trade some of those scenes for more Tom Riddle memories; you know, like the ones that allow the next book, and by extension the storyline for the next two movies, to make any kind of rational sense? What was supposed to be a physically and emotionally taxing quest to find the tools that will defeat the greatest evil in the wizarding world turned into "Harry and grandpa go for a boatride, then grandpa eats too much soup." An adaptation should at least capture the gist and the overall point and feel of the source material. This adaptation took a compelling story and turned it into a PG13 horror movie, complete with drug use cliches and suggested premarital sex. All you need is a butcher knife and some boobie shots, and you have yourself a slasher film.
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