TOP 10: SCARY MOVIE packs 'em in

By: Patrick Sauriol
Date: Sunday, October 26, 2003

Dimension Films third SCARY MOVIE packed them in at theaters this weekend, blowing away the record for an October opening. SCARY MOVIE 3 took in an estimated $49.7 million dollars over its first three days, surpassing the prior October record holder, 2002's RED DRAGON, by $13 M. SM3 also proved to be the best opening in the franchise's history, beating the opening of the first SCARY MOVIE by $7.3 M.

What could have contributed to the massive performance for SM3? For starters, this sequel was rated PG-13, allowing more younger viewers in to see it; the past two SCARY MOVIE films were both rated R. Yeah, but then how did all those underage kids know to check out the latest SCARY MOVIE if they hadn't seen the earlier films? Ah, the magic of home video...isn't it a grand thing? Hollywood thinks so, and so do babysitters.

Last weekend's champ, THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE, isn't out of gas yet. A $14 M haul over the weekend is about a 50% drop from its opening weekend gross, and with Halloween still to come, MASSACRE will still have some buzz in it. The new football drama RADIO turned out to be the film audiences not interested in jokes or gore went to see, nabbing a clean $14 M.

In its second week of release, Fox's RUNAWAY JURY scooped up $8.4 M. That's good news for Fox execs who were burying their heads in the sand last week when the film only took in $11 M. The picture still has a long, long way to go to earn back its budget ($60 M), but a drop of only 29% is better than expected.


Clint Eastwood's MYSTIC RIVER and the Jack Black starrer SCHOOL OF ROCK also had fortunate results. Overall, all the films in the top 10 did well for this week. In other genre box office news, HOUSE OF THE DEAD is resting at #21 with just a shade under $9.5 M in total receipts and UNDERWORLD is at #24 with almost $51 M in grosses.

Here's the list of the top ten grossing films from October 24 to 26, their weekend gross and the film's total domestic gross to date:

1. SCARY MOVIE 3 $49,700,000 $49,700,000
2. THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE $14,700,000 $51,176,000
3. RADIO $14,000,000 $14,000,000
4. RUNAWAY JURY $8,425,000 $24,035,000
5. MYSTIC RIVER $7,605,000 $24,551,000
6. SCHOOL OF ROCK $6,500,000 $63,372,000
7. KILL BILL VOLUME 1 $5,978,000 $53,660,000
8. GOOD BOY! $4,850,000 $31,889,000
9. INTOLERABLE CRUELTY $3,572,000 $28,195,000
10. UNDER THE TUSCAN SUN $2,217,000 $37,179,000


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