Box Office Report: "The Hunger Games" Slays "Wrath of the Titans"

It was another strong showing for "The Hunger Games" this weekend, more than doubling the take from any of its competitors. The two new releases, "Wrath of the Titans" and "Mirror Mirror", fell short of expectations, while "21 Jump Street" continued with stronger-than-expected numbers for its third week.

Check out the full numbers and breakdown after the jump.

So "The Hunger Games" is doing pretty good. If you didn't get that from its record-setting opening weekend, then this weekend's numbers will surely convince you. The film has now done over $150MM nationally in just over two weeks. There aren't many words for the performance this film is putting together other than impressive. I saw the movie last weekend, and I enjoyed it. It didn't scream these kinds of figures at me, but what do I know? I see the appeal though, and I've heard strong buzz about the books for years. "Wrath of the Titans" looked like it would be the only film that could provide any kind of competition whatsoever for this film over the next few weeks, and while Titans put up some decent numbers, "The Hunger Games" still pretty much did what it wanted. Next week the only notable new release is "American Reunion", and while I expect decent things from it, I don't expect it to be a direct competitor with this film. If anything, it should take a chunk from "21 Jump Street" as I expect they have similar audiences.

As I mentioned, "Wrath of the Titans" and "Mirror Mirror" were the new releases this weekend. As you can see by their budgets, Titans even more so than "Mirror Mirror", they didn't come very close to their marks. You can read my review of "Wrath of the Titans" here, but overall, I think fans are still sour from the first installment. And the critical reviews didn't help much either. I'm not sure where this series goes from here, but just as with the last one, foreign box office numbers will be plenty strong to warrant another chapter if the studio so desires.

"Mirror Mirror" looks to kind of just be sitting there. The numbers weren't terrible, but they weren't overwhelming either. Reviews have been mixed, and while it seems easy to digest, I'm just not sure there are massive audiences interested in this tale. I'm curious to see what happens with this one next week; either word of mouth will be strong and it will have a good second-showing, or no one will talk about it, as it kind of feels, and I'd expect it will take a huge hit.

"21 Jump Street" looked much more solid than I expected it would in its third weekend. This has got very strong critical reviews for a film of this nature, and the word of mouth has been powerful. I loved the film and highly recommend everyone to check it out if you get a chance. As I stated above, I think next weekend's "American Reunion" will spoil some of this film's fun, but I want that movie to succeed as well, so I'm not too disappointed by that. And this movie has now taken in over $90MM, and it shouldn't have a problem crossing the $100MM mark, which has to be looked at as a huge success for the film.

Otherwise, "Dr. Seuss' The Lorax" continued its chug, with a respectable $8MM in its fifth weekend. More than anything I just can't believe that movie has been out for more than a month already. I've talked about its successes plenty though, so there's not much more to get into there.

"Salmon Fishing in the Yemen" and "Jeff Who Lives At Home" both increased their theater counts this week and showed the only increases of anything in the top 15. I don't really expect either of these to go wide nationally, but most of us should get a chance with either of them somewhere down the road. And from what I've seen and heard, these are both pretty solid films.


Also, something I wanted to add, which doesn't appear in the graphic below, but "The Woman in Black" crossed the $100MM mark world-wide this weekend, and became the highest-grossing British Horror film in the last 50 years. It's done so well across the Atlantic that the studio has already announced a sequel for the film. I haven't seen the film yet, but our fellow writer, Ben Foutch, did. He wrote about it here. The film didn't look ground-breaking in anyway, but it did seem solid. That's a nice accomplishment, and any time a genre film can record those kinds of numbers I'm happy.

As for everything that showed up in the top 15 this weekend, check below, courtesy of Box Office Mojo: