Weekend Receipts: Easy Street
Always remember: If you're in need of a quick buck, find some decades old horror franchise to resuscitate, make it more violent and -- if you can -- put it in 3D. A Nightmare on Elm Street hit two of those three benchmarks (here's hoping the sequel is in 3D!) and, not surprisingly, cruised to an easy victory at the box office in this calm before the Iron Man 2 storm. Pop an Ambien and grab a blanket, it's time for some weekend receipts.
1. A Nightmare on Elm Street
Gross: $32,205,000 (new)
Screens: 3,332 (PSA: $9,665)
Weeks: 1
Not to rain on the New Line parade, but that Elm Street grossed almost half of its $32 million on Friday probably doesn't portend great successes ahead. On the plus side, Freddy Krueger has now joined Darth Vader as the only villain to reach number one at the box office in four decades.
2. How to Train Your Dragon
Gross: $10,825,000 ($192,385,000)
Screens: 3,426 (PSA: $3,160)
Weeks: 6 (change: -29.5%)
Sometime tomorrow, Dragon will pass Madagascar on the list of Dreamworks Animation successes and by next weekend, it will top last spring's Monsters vs. Aliens. Which begs the question: What took Dreamworks so long to greenlight a sequel?
3. Date Night
Gross: $7,600,000 ($73,627,000)
Screens: 3,093 (PSA: $2,457)
Weeks: 4 (change: -27.4%)
To give you an idea about the staying power of Date Night: Among the holdovers, it had the lowest decline in the top-ten. It's Avatar for married couples!
4. The Back-Up Plan
Gross: $7,240,000 ($22,950,000)
Screens: 3,280 (PSA: $2,207)
Weeks: 2 (change: -40.7%)
At least The Back-Up Plan has done better than J.Lo's unreleased (and possibly unreleasable) album?
5. Furry Vengeance
Gross: $6,500,000 (new)
Screens: 2,997 (PSA: $2,169)
Weeks: 1
Bombs away! But who cares? Summit Entertainment is just treading water until The Twilight Saga: Eclipse comes out in June. Whatever Furry Vengeance grosses will probably just get added onto the Breaking Dawn hair product budget.