The 25 Worst Opening Weekends of All Time
By Dustin Rowles | Box Office Round-Ups | September 3, 2012 | Comments ()
If you have a movie opening on over 2,000 screens, and it doesn’t make at least $5 million on opening weekend, it’s likely as a result of being 1) a terrible movie, and/or 2) with a horrible marketing strategy and/or 3) it has a terrible title. Oogieloves In The BIG Balloon Adventure had a potent combination of all three, and the result was the worst box-office opening weekend of all time. The movie — which follows some Teletubby-like blobs searching for balloons — averaged around $206 per theater over the weekend, which translates to about 2 people per showing, an even bigger bomb once you consider that one of those two people — the parent — had no desire to be there. Most movies that open on over 2,000 theaters will at least grab a few people in each showing standing in the mall who buy a ticket based solely on the movie title. That wasn’t the case here. Only one other movie — Delgo — comes even close to the disaster that is the Oogieloves.
Here’s the 25 Worst Opening Weekends of All Time (2,000 screens or more).
1. Oogieloves In The BIG Balloon Adventure — $445,000
2. Delgo — $511,000
3. P2 — $2.083 milion
4. Major League: Back to the Minors — $2.087 million
5. The Real Cancun — $2.10 million
6. Spider-Man / Men in Black II (Special Double Feature) — $2.11 million
7. College — $2.15 million
8. The Adventures of Pluto Nash — $2.18 million
9. Bandslam — $2.23 million
10. All Dogs Go To Heaven 2 — $2.25 million
11. Deception — $2.3 million
12. I Dreamed of Africa — $2.41 million
13. Teacher’s Pet — $2.46 million
14. Grind — $2.5 million
15. The Rocker — $2.6 million
16. Lucky You — $2.6 million
17. From Justin to Kelly — $2.7 million
18. The Last Legion — $2.74 million
19. Thunderbirds — $2.77 million
20. Alone in the Dark — $2.8 million
21. Most Wanted — $2.83 million
22. Almost Heroes — $2.83 million
23. What Planet Are You From? — $3 million
24. Grandma’s Boy — $3.009 million
25. Lost and Found — $3.02 million
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I watch a lot of movies, and besides the Spider-Man/Men in Black II double feature, I think I’ve only seen four on that list. And oh yeah: Don’t expect a review of Oogieloves In The BIG Balloon Adventure. We’re cruel to our kids’ critic Agent Bedhead, but we’re not that cruel.
Elsewhere at the box office, it was a quiet Labor Day weekend, per usual. The Possession ended up claiming the top spot with a strong $21.3 million over the four-day frame. That’s actually the second-highest opening weekend ever for a Labor Day movie, behind the Halloween remake’s $30 million.
Lawless pulled up into second place with $13 million ($15 million since it opened on Wednesday), which is somewhat disappointed considering a cast that included Tom Hardy, Shia LaBeouf, and Jessica Chastain, in addition to solid overall reviews.
In third and fourth place were August action film holdovers The Expendables 2 ($11 million, $68 million cumulative) and The Bourne Legacy ($9.3 million, $98 million), and in fifth place, Paranorman brought its overall total to $40 million.
It’s also worth noting that The Dark Knight Rises surpassed the $1 billion mark worldwide over the weekend, passing The Dark Knight and becoming just the 12th movie ever cross that financial threshold.
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