Box Office - 'Couples Retreat' Cruises to Easy Win

We hinted at this kind of performance yesterday, and really, the numbers now are quite staggering. Couples Retreat, the week's only new movie to pop up in a significant amount of theaters, was far and away the top choice of moviegoers, showing no decline worth mentioning on Saturday and Sunday. It started the weekend with $12 million and change and managed to earn right around $35 million for the weekend, according to Box Office Mojo. Despite bad reviews, the Vince Vaughn comedy clearly knew its target demo, saturated the marketplace over the past couple of weeks, and is now reaping the rewards. For Vaughn, it's another great opening weekend that proves he's still one of the best bets in Hollywood. Fred Claus has been his less successful film in the past five years, and even that movie made $100 million worldwide. However, with a $70 million budget (plus marketing costs, which were considerable here), there's still a long way to go before COuples Retreat will be seen as a blockbuster. The same can not be said of Paranormal Activity, the lowest-budget movie perhaps in history to make the top five at the box office. A $7 million weekend in 159 theaters is more than triple the previous record for a film in such few theaters. How much money has it made? Well, not counting marketing money, Transformers earned about $4 for every dollar spent, The Hangover took in about $11 for each dollar spent, and Paranormal Activity has made roughly $690 for every dollar spent. Wow. We mentioned in yesterday's box office discussion that Blair Witch is the king of profit margin (a dizzying $4,130 per budgetary dollar), but it's been about that long since a movie could be put in this discussion. The difference is, almost all the marketing for Paranormal Activity is word of mouth and internet articles. Paramount isn't spending much, outside of theater rentals. The film trailed Zombieland, Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs, and Toy Story/Toy Story 2, and is very close to passing Whip It!, which comes from Fox Searchlight, the unquestioned leader in marketing lower budget films. Why that film hasn't done better is a complete mystery. Because Couples Retreat was so consistent this weekend, that could mean another $17 - $20 million in the next frame, plus about $15 million more during the week. So by the time it's ten days into its run, it will just about break even, and with no comparable comedy in sight, this film should coast over $100 million with no problem. Paranormal goes wide next weekend, albeit against a very crowded field, but it's conceivable that the micro-budgeted horror movie could double its box office from ths weekend, putting it close to $30 million. The Top Five:
1 - Couples Retreat ($35.3 million)
2 - Zombieland ($15 million)
3 - Chance of Meatballs ($12 million)
4 - Toy Story/Toy Story 2 ($7.6 million)
5 - Paranormal Activity ($7 million)

Comments

[Chris]

I'm glad to see that "Paranormal Activity" is doing so well. It's a great scary movie. We need more movies like this. Blood and guts doesn't equal scary.