Weekend Box Office Report: Christmas at the Museum

By: Karl Schneider
Date: Sunday, December 24, 2006
Source: Yahoo!

The Christmas holiday belongs to Night at the Museum. Taking in approximately $30.8 million, Night at the Museum staked it's claim to the top spot of the holiday box office with a solid gross that should translate to a leggy and impressive box office run.

Will Smith's Pursuit of Happyness came in second place adding approximately $15 million to it's coffers and bringing it's total thus far to over $53 million.

In third place we find the underdog Rocky Balboa managing approximately $12.5 million in it's first weekend for total of over $22 million thus far. For a film that was made on a budget of only $25 million, the gross is solid and should translate to a very profitable box office run.

It wasn't all sunshine and candy canes at the box office this weekend, the sport's drama We Are Marshall became the latest disappointment at the box office managing a paltry $6.6 million and a lump of coal in it's first weekend. Blame poor marketing.

In other news, Casino Royale made another $3 million and is quickly on the way to becoming the highest grossing Bond film of all time. Apocalypto continued it's fall into oblivion making only $3 million for the weekend for a disappointing total of only $34 million. Despite good reviews and WOM, the film has dropped like a rock since opening and the logical reasoning seems to be director Mel Gibson's recent troubles.

Until next week ...

1. "Night at the Museum," $30.8 million.
2. "The Pursuit of Happyness," $15 million.
3. "Rocky Balboa," $12.5 million.
4. "The Good Shepherd," $10 million.
5. "Charlotte's Web," $8 million.
6. "Eragon," $7.15 million.
7. "We Are Marshall," $6.6 million.
8. "Happy Feet," $5.1 million.
9. "The Holiday," $5 million.
10. "The Nativity Story," $4.65 million.

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Comments/Responses

Spiderparker • Dec 24, 2006, 02:53pm •

I just saw the movie on Friday on opening day with my family. To be honest I was pleasantly surprised. I like Ben Stiller alot, but was for some reason didn't think the movie would be that great. I was wrong. I loved every minute. Once the story ramps up in the movie and the "majic" starts to happen, your drawn in willingly into the world that's created in the story. My wife and son loved it as much as me and there worse critics than me. It's a perfect holiday movie. Money well spent.

Dazzler • Dec 24, 2006, 07:15pm •

For a movie that costs 25 mil it should do pretty good at the B.O. Go Rocky go! Great story, not my fav fight in the Rockies that would still be the Drago fight in IV!

mckracken • Dec 24, 2006, 08:35pm •

"Apocalypto continued it's fall into oblivion making only $3 million for the weekend for a disappointing total of only $34 million. Despite good reviews and WOM, the film has dropped like a rock since opening and the logical reasoning seems to be director Mel Gibson's recent troubles."
hmm... lets analize this? could it be that people generally dont care about Mel's troubles and instead wanted to go see Happy Feet or Night at the Museum or Pusuit of Happyness instead of a subtitled movie about Mayan blood rituals and human sacrafices?
hmmm... nah. maybe the theatergoes are really out to get the Anti-Semite drunk Mel for his comments a few months back.
we'll have to watch the next Jackie Chan flick to see if the same thing holds true there.

almostunbiased • Dec 24, 2006, 08:46pm •

What did Jackie do?

theCOLLECTOR • Dec 24, 2006, 11:14pm •

Rocky Balboa received much better reveiws than Night at the Museum. I think the Fantastic Four 2 Trailer had a lot to do with Night at the Museum solid opening. Not a lot of people I have heard enjoyed the movie. Rocky on the other hand I have hear great things, and a lot of users on various sites praise Rocky Balboa. Hopefully it gets it due credit in the long run.

snallygaster • Dec 25, 2006, 08:36pm •

To expand a bit on mckracken's analysis of the drop in Apocalypto's box office, here's some other thoughts:

1) Those people who boycotted this movie because of Gibson's drunken rant from earlier this year would likely not have been there during its opening weekend. In other words, most of the impact that these people had would have been felt during the opening weekend, not subsequent weekends.

2) The advertising for Apocalypto made it look like an action movie (which it is) while avoiding the fact that it's subtitled in order to court the typical action movie audience (who generally don't like subtitles). Word-of-mouth has been good, but that same word-of-mouth also spreads the word that it's subtitled, which no doubt is losing some potential filmgoers.

3) It's Christmas weekend. Apocalypto is a violent R-rated movie - not exactly the type of flick to take the kids and grandparents to over the holiday weekend.

If I were to single out one movie to comment on its box office drop, it would have to be Eragon. Not only is it a family friendly movie, it's filling the fantasy movie adaptation niche this holiday season that was previously so successful for LotR, Potter, and Narnia. Yet its second weekend out, it dropped a staggering nearly 70% from its opening weekend! That's a bigger drop than even most crappy horror movies experience in their first week (and horror movies traditionally take a huge dive their second weekend out).

For what it's worth, I didn't catch any of the flicks in the top ten. I instead opted for the Denzel Washington movie Deja Vu (I wanted to catch it before it left theaters). It was worth a matinee (fortunately I had a free pass), but it's a movie that won't lose much when it hits video either.

wessmith1966 • Dec 25, 2006, 09:24pm •

Skipped "museum," because I'm not a Stiller fan. I thought Rocky Balboa was a terrific film, and Stallone gave a wonderful, close to the heart, performance. It was a terrific ending to Rocky's story. Went to see Black Christmas tonight; a fun 80's throwback slasher film. Eragon tanked because it was just a bad movie (except for some of the effects) with bad acting (except for Irons' performance).

karlschneider • Dec 25, 2006, 10:19pm •

The reason i wrote as i did about Apocalypto is because:

A) The Christmas box office tends to lead to very small week to week drops for films.
B) Apocalypto had a very solid opening
C) Apocalypto has since fallen off much harder than normal for a film of it's type.

Basically, the reason I said what I did is simply because Apocalypto has experienced unexpected harsh drops in the weeks following it's release. Normaly films with good WOM and reviews don't have that problem.

snallygaster • Dec 26, 2006, 10:20am •

Karl, I think we just have to agree to disagree on this one. I really think Apocalypto's box office drop has much more to do with its R-rating, subtitles. and lack of on-screen star than Gibson's rant. The reviews and WOM have been positive, but not overwhelming enough to overcome these drawbacks (Rottentomatoes records only 66% positive reviews).

Overall, I don't think Apocalypto's drop-off is that surprising. In its second weekend, it dropped 46.6%. Compare that to Pursuit of Happyness's second weekend (this weekend) where it dropped 43.5% from its first weekend. Happyness took almost the same second-week tumble as Apocalypto, and it's exactly the type of heartwarming movie that should benefit from the Christmas weekend "bounce" (not to mention it stars Hollywood's biggest box office draw).

bjjdenver • Dec 26, 2006, 12:00pm •

I skipped Museum, mainly because I don't pay $$ to see a family movie. Was headed for Good Shepherd, but it was sold out. Due to the blizzard, I was limited on theatres and start times, so I went with Casino Royale...and I couldn't have made a better choice. Great movie and DC really does an excellent job. If you haven't seen it do so now while you can still get it on a good screen.

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