It was a shocking and unusual weekend at the box office. Fanboys (and girls) are all scratching their heads trying to figure out how Kick-Ass got its butt kicked by a four week old dragon. That’s right, How to Train Your Dragon claimed the number one spot by a narrow margin of about $250,000, which means we may have a repeat of last week. If you recall, when I wrote the box office piece last week, Date Night was the winner, but by the time the final numbers came in on Monday, it turned out that Clash of the Titans had edged out Date Night by a cool million.
How to Train Your Dragon fell only 20% (remarkable for four weeks in release), and now has made $158 Million. Early numbers are showing about $20 Million for the weekend. Other films that actually seemed to gain momentum during their theatrical run were A Christmas Carol, and Avatar. Dragon was well received by critics and audiences alike, and is truly family friendly, but to win the box office your fourth week out is rather rare. Dreamworks has got to be thrilled.
Kick-Ass got some pretty solid critic reviews (78% on Rotten Tomatoes as of Sunday evening), but it seems like audiences just didn’t connect with the movie, and much as it pains me to say so, it appears movie and comic nerds are not a strong enough force to prop a movie up.
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