Weekend Box Office
1) Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen $112 million
2) The Proposal $18.4 million
3) The Hangover $17.2 million
4) Up $13 million
5) My Sister's Keeper $12 million
6) Year One $5.8 million
7) The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3 $5.4 million
8) Star Trek $3.6 million
9) Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian $3.5 million
10) Away We Go $1.6 million
As most suspected, Michael Bay's giant robot sequel Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen owned the weekend, earning a little over $112 million. Though it broke many new records, it failed to live up to studio expectations, becoming only the seventh highest grossing opener in cinematic history. Clearly, it was no match for the The Dark Knight, which took in $158 million when it opened in July of last year. Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen had the second highest opening day earnings of all time with $60.6 million. The Dark Knight still holds the record with $67 million. As for firsts, Bay's latest action extravaganza, which stars Shia LaBeouf and Megan Fox, became the highest grossing Wednesday earner of all time, as well as 2009's highest grossing weekend opener. It holds the highest grossing June opening, as well as the top five day grosses for a movie opening on a Wednesday. Domestically, the film has earned a total of $201.2 million. Worldwide, it has pulled in $281.4 million, yet hasn't broken any records on that front. Despite all of these new record setting grosses, the film failed to score with critics. That shouldn't hurt its future potential, as audiences seemed to enjoy it quite a bit. Especially the teens, and that's where most of the repeat ticket sales come from. Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen could linger around the top five for the rest of the summer.
Walt Disney's The Proposal stayed on its knees this weekend, earning Anne Fletcher's deportation rom-com another $18.4 million for that coveted second place spot. Sandra Bullock and Ryan Reynolds were able to fend for themselves, and give non-robot loving audiences a hilarious alternative. The film has thus far pulled in an impressive $69 million dollars. Todd Phillip's surprise hit of the summer The Hangover also continues to chug along. It fell to third place during its fourth week in release, earning another $17.2 million. With total earnings of $183.2 million, it is guaranteed to reach the $200 million mark before the end of the summer.
Disney/Pixar's Up, which has remained at the top of the charts for five weeks, dropped to number four with another $13 million to its name. Thus far, the film, which follows a 78-year-old balloon salesman named Carl Fredricksen (Ed Asner) as he fulfils his lifelong dream of visiting the wilds of South America, has earned a total of $250 million. Pretty impressive, as it is now the highest grossing film of the year, besting Star Trek, which has now earned $246 million after eight weeks in release. Up is now the number four most successful Pixar film of all time, just surpassing 1999's
This week's only other major new release didn't create much racket. The Cameron Diaz weeper My Sister's Keeper dropped in at number five with just $12 million to its name. I guess nobody was in the mood for a heavy family drama. Kathryn Bigalow's wartime action film The Hurt Locker bested Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen on the per screen average front. The film took in an estimated $36,000 per screen for a total of $144,000 playing in just four theaters. If given the 4,234 screens held by Optimus Prime, the film could have potentially earned $1.5 billion to become the highest grossing film in history.
Next week, the Autobots will have to go head to head with John Dillinger in Michael Mann's Public Enemies, starring Johnny Depp and Christian Bale, as well as the rascally prehistoric team from Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs. It's quite possible that Manny, Diego, and Sid could cause a major upset at the box office. Hey, anything's possible.