A scene from Megamind, which stars Will Ferrell, Tina Fey and Brad Pitt
That capricious smarty-pants with the big blue head can keep on cackling. In its second time around, DreamWorks' 3D animated feature Megamind again dominated the North American box office, according to early studio estimates. Its $30.1 million, down just 34% from last weekend's opening, was more than enough to vanquish Denzel Washington and his runaway train. Unstoppable, amped up from a real event in Ohio in 2001, ran like Speed with a diesel engine and pulled a comely 69 rating of Metacritic's survey of movie reviewers. It was in the top spot Friday, but fell to Megamind's Saturday onslaught of kids and their indulgent parents. The other newbies, Skyline and Morning Glory finished far behind.
The opening of Washington's fifth collaboration with director Tony Scott was in line with the early grosses of the previous four — Crimson Tide, Man on Fire, Deja Vu and The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3 — though less than the first-weekend take of either American Gangster (directed by Tony's brother Ridley) or this January's The Book of Eli. Anyway, the man is a star with a long, strong light. Of the 14 Denzel-starring films of the past decade, all but two earned more than $20 million the first weekend. One of those two, The Great Debaters, opened in limited release; the $16.2 million earned in its first three days by the other, the 2003 Out of Time, would be $21.3 million today. That's an impressive record for a 55-year-old, showing more consistent muscle than any actor who came of age in the 1980s except for Tom Cruise.
Morning Glory was supposed to be a star-making vehicle for Rachel McAdams, who had played the female leads in the popular weepies The Notebook and The Time Traveler's Wife and was aiming to join Katherine Heigl, Kate Hudson, Reese Witherspoon and the newly anointed Emma Stone as a rom-com goddess. Didn't happen, at least for now. Morning Glory, shot in the spring and summer of 2009 for $40 million, attracted only $9.6 million worth of customers this weekend, $12.2 million since its Tuesday-midnight opening.
The science-fiction disaster movie Skyline earned nearly as much in three days, and it was made for a thrifty $10 million — by Greg and Colin Strause, the special-effects wizards who also directed the 2007 horror-reunion sequel Aliens vs Predators: Requiem. In Hollywood, success is determined not only by what your film makes but by what it cost to make. By that standard, Morning Glory is a flop, Skyline a kind of hit.
In the nanoworld of indie films, 127 Hours, expanding from four to 22 theaters in its second week, held strong with a heroic $453,000, parlaying the pedigree of its true-life loner-hero story, its Oscar-winning director (Slumdog Millionaire's Danny Boyle) and the news that folks keep fainting during the big surgery scene. Its $20,591 per-screen average was topped only by the $22,450 earned in one Manhattan theater by Tiny Furniture, a homecoming comedy for which 24-year-old writer-director-star Lena Dunham cast her mother (artist Laurie Simmons), sister and friends as, more or less, themselves. Dunham, whose web series Tight Spots runs on Nerve.com, made her first feature for just $50,000 — further proof, after the success of last year's microbudgeted Paranormal Activity, that the movieplex has room for all things great and tiny.
Here are the Sunday estimates of this weekend,s top-grossing pictures in North American theaters, as reported by Box Office Mojo:
1. Megamind, $30.1 million; $89.8 million, second week
2. Unstoppable, $23.5 million, first weekend
3. Due Date, $15.5 million; $59 million, second week
4. Skyline, $11.7 million, first weekend
5. Morning Glory, $9.6 million, first weekend; $12.2 million, first five days
6. For Colored Girls, $6.75 million; $30.9 million, second week
7. Red, $5.1 million; $79.8 million, fifth week
8. Paranormal Activity 2, $3.05 million; $82 million, fourth week
9. Saw 3D, $2.75 million; $43.5 million, third week
10. Jackass 3D, $2.3 million; $114.7 million, fifth week