Weekend Box Office: Avatar for the Win!

For the sixth straight week, Avatar has topped the U.S. box office chart fighting off all new releases. The film held steady with an additional 36 million dollars after being in theaters for over a month. It overcame the debut of ScreenGems religious epic, Legion with Paul Bettany and Dennis Quaid, which debuted at number 2 with over 18 million dollars. The movie was pretty entertaining and more people should have gone out to see it, but every thing’s fair in love and Avatar. The Hughes Brothers’ Book of Eli slipped one spot from last week with 17 million dollars, and another new release, Fox’s Tooth Fairy didn’t fair so well. The Dwayne Johnson family comedy came in at number 4 with just over 14 million dollars. It’s not bad in comparison to the two films in front of it, but Avatar‘s gross makes it look like a spec on the people’s radar.

Here’s the breakdown of this week’s numbers…

1. Avatar | LW 1 | Fox | Weekend US Gross $36,00,000 | Average Per Theater $11,461 | Total US Gross $552,797,00 | Week 6
2. Legion | New | SGem | Weekend US Gross $18,200,000 | Average Per Theater $7,351 | Total US Gross $18,200,000 |Production Budget $26 |Week 1
3. The Book of Eli| LW 2 | WB | Weekend US Gross $17,000,000 | Average Per Theater $5,464 | Total US Gross $62,003,000 |Production Budget $80 |Week 2
4. Tooth Fairy | New | Fox | Weekend US Gross $14,500,000 | Average Per Theater $4,336 | Total US Gross $14,500,000 |Production Budget $48 |Week 1
5. The Lovely Bones | LW 3| P/DW| Weekend US Gross $8,800,000 | Average Per Theater $3,423 | Total US Gross $31,624,000 |Production Budget $65 |Week 7
6. Sherlock Holmes | LW 5 | WB | Weekend US Gross $7,115,000 | Average Per Theater $2,665 | Total US Gross $191,564,000 | Production Budget $90 | Week 5
7. Extraordinary Measures | New | CBS | Weekend US Gross $7,000,000 | Average Per Theater $2,746 | Total US Gross $7,000,000 |Production Budget $31 |Week 1
8. Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel | LW 4  | Fox | Weekend US Gross $6,500,000 | Average Per Theater $2,186 | Total US Gross $204,237,000 | Production Budget $75 | Week 5
9. It’s Complicated | LW 7 | Uni. | Weekend US Gross $6,190,000 | Average Per Theater $2,690 | Total US Gross $98,650,000 | Production Budget $85 | Week 5
10. The Spy Next Door | LW 6 | LGF | Weekend US Gross $4,750,000 | Average Per Theater $1,624 | Total US Gross $18,710,000|Week 2

Around this time next week we will be confirming that Avatar has toppled the worldwide record held by Titanic. The other James Cameron epic has been the largest grossing release domestically and internationally for 13 years and its reign is about to end. Avatar is just shy 50 million from it’s domestic gross, and a mere 6 million off its worldwide total.

What film did you see last weekend?