By Dustin Rowles | Box Office Round-Ups | September 23, 2013 |
By Dustin Rowles | Box Office Round-Ups | September 23, 2013 |
It was not a dramatic weekend at the box office, as Hugh Jackman and Jake Gyllenhaal’s Prisoners opened in first place, outdistancing everyone else with $21 million. Great, intense, hard-to-watch movie, although as Steven suggested in his review, it was not a thematically charged film. Nevertheless, I thought Gyllenhaal crushed it, quietly putting together strong back-to-back performances (see also End of Watch), proving that Oscar nomination for Brokeback Mountain was not a fluke.
In second place, Insidious: Chapter 2 added $14.5 million, while The Family added $7 million. The Spanish language film, Instructions Not Included, actually jumped two places to number three with $5.7 million (bringing its total to $34 million), while the week’s other new entry, Battle of the Year, bombed with $5 million (on a $20 million budget). I guess the combination of Josh Holloway and Chris Brown just didn’t have the box-office appeal everyone must have been anticipating.
Among other new entries was also I Spit On Your Grave 2, the sequel to the remake, which itself only earned $572,000 worldwide on a $2 million budget. So, why a remake? I’m guessing a bunch of sickos bought a lot of I Spit On Your Grave DVDs to put it in the black (otherwise, I have no idea why a sequel was greenlit). At any rate, the sequel nevertheless opened with a measly $350 after opening in one theater. That has to be the worst opening of the year, right?
Nope. There were actually six other films with worse openings in 2013, including one starring Emily Mortimer and Christina Hendricks, who probably spent more for one bra than the entire weekend take of her film. I also actually watched number six down there, Syrup, but it was so awful I couldn’t even bother reviewing it.
Here’s the ten worst openings of the year (each opening in one theater).
1. Storage 24 (with Doctor Who’s Noel Clark): $72
2. Into the White: $90
3. Hammer of the Gods: $164
4. Evil Intent: $205
5. Leonie (with Emily Mortimer and Christina Hendricks): $291
6. Syrup (with Amber Heard, Kellen Lutz, and Brittany Snow): $301
7. I Spit On Your Grave 2: $350
8. Triumph of the Wall: $401
9. A Dark Truth (with Andy Garcia, Forrest Whitaker, and Eva Longoria): $630
10. Veer!: $713