Quotes of the Day

With 9/11 tributes dominating the news and the TV networks, Americans got their minds off a national catastrophe by watching a movie about a worldwide plague. Contagion, the killer-virus procedural directed by Steven Soderbergh and starring Matt Damon, Kate Winslet, Laurence Fishburne, Marion Cotillard and Jennifer Ehle, won the weekend at the North American box office by earning $23.1 million, according to early studio estimates.

An upmarket, adult-skewing version of Resident Evil: Afterlife, which had taken in $26.5 million this weekend last year, Contagion attracted the over-25 set in droves: a seismic, geriatric 81% of the total audience. But the film's disappointing B- rating from opening-night moviegoers polled by CinemaScore suggests that Contagion may not stay around much longer than Gwyneth Paltrow's character in the movie. (She dies after five minutes.)

If the spectacle of Oscar-winning stars coughing and then kaputting at pandemic rates wasn't depressing enough, Hollywood could get the blues staring at the latest stat sheet. The weekend is projected to gross a minuscule total of $80.83 million, the lowest total take of 2011. Think of it: more customers braced the elements to buy tickets during Hurricane Irene two weeks ago than on this mostly balmy September frame.

The new entries enticed few patrons. Only $5.6 million worth paid to watch Tom Hardy and Joel Edgerton as brothers pursuing a mixed-martial-arts title and pummeling each other's hardbodies in the family-fighting drama Warrior. Nick Swardson's R-rated porn-film parody, Bucky Larson: Born to Be a Star, hit theaters with the equivalent of a terrorism alert — a perfect zero rating on the Rotten Tomatoes aggregate site of movie reviews — and managed a teeny-weeny $1.5 million at 1,500 theaters. Kevin Hart's comedy-concert film, Laugh at My Pain, did quite a bit better ($2 million) in just 97 venues.

Aside from Contagion, the only bright spot on the top 10 list was another movie for adults. The Help, the inspirational interracial weepie that has earned $137.1 million since opening Aug. 10, dropped to second place after three weeks at No. 1. The movie nonetheless scored the longest daily run in the top spot — 25 days — since The Sixth Sense in 1999, per Box Office Mojo. Its run also marked the first time since Avatar that a film has occupied either the first or second slot for as long as five weeks. Those are impressive records and bode well for this generously reviewed film's chances in the awards season.

Still, Hollywood needs more than The Help to lure its core sectors of teens and young adults. Those crucial demographics ignored movie theaters for the first four months of the year, came back in force from late April (Fast Five) through early August (Rise of the Planet of the Apes) but have again gone into hiding. If the trend continues, and young audiences stay away except when the weather warms up, the film industry will face its own crippling, if not fatal, contagion.

Here are the Sunday estimates of this weekend's top-grossing pictures in North American theaters, as reported by Box Office Mojo:

1. Contagion, $23.1 million, first weekend
2. The Help, $8.7 million; $137.1 million, fifth week
3. Warrior, $5.6 million, first weekend
4. The Debt, $4.9 million; $22 million, second week
5. Colombiana, $4 million; $29.8 million, third week
6. Rise of the Planet of the Apes, $3.9 million; $167.8 million, sixth week
7. Shark Night 3D, $3.5 million; $14.8 million, second week
8. Apollo 18, $2.9 million; $15 million, second week
9. Our Idiot Brother, $2.8 million; $21.4 million, third week
10. Spy Kids: All the Time in the World, $2.5 million; $34.2 million, fourth week

• Richard Corliss
• The lowest weekend take of the year is another sign that younger audiences are avoiding the multiplex