'Hansel & Gretel' on top while 'Parker,' 'Movie 43' struggle

This week, all it took to be at the top of the box office was $19 million. Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters grabbed the top spot, but the box office as a whole was slightly dampened because of snow on the East Coast Friday night. Hansel & Gretel would have earned even less if there hadn't
been 3D surcharges. Fellow new releases Parker and Movie 43 also bombed with audiences, but returning features fared much better.

Parker finished fifth with $7 million. The adult-leaning actioner had plenty of R-rated competition, which made it hard for the Jason Statham-led actioner to break from the pack. It's likely many moviegoers opted for a must-see awards contender instead. In fact, it was an especially good weekend for R-rated Oscar nominees Silver Linings Playbook, Zero Dark Thirty, and Django Unchained. Silver Linings Playbook was off just 7% from the previous week, an impressive hold, especially given that last weekend included the MLK holiday. That gave the romantic comedy another $10 million for a $69 million cumulative total to date, not bad for a picture reported to have cost just $21 million. Zero Dark Thirty was off 38% to $9.8 million. Django Unchained also posted a dip of just 35% for a finish at $5 million--bringing it
just shy of a $150 million domestic total.

Jessica Chastain's other release, Mama, placed two spots higher than ZDT with $12.8 million. It was just one of two PG-13 picture in the top ten (PG-13 Les Miserables placed tenth with $3.9 million). Mama is getting a boost not only because star Chastain is an Oscar nominee, but because of the dearth of PG-13 options. Maybe Parker would have fared better if it had a more inclusive rating.

The decidedly juvenile but R-rated Movie 43 bombed with just $5 million. The collection
of comedy skits featured huge names, but I'm sure all those stars' daily rates added together would cost most than the $5 million it totaled for the weekend. This may be the kind of raunchy comedy that gets more traction in the aftermarket, where kids have an easier time seeing R-rated movies--because this clearly isn't the kind of movie an adult finds funny.

This Friday, Sylvester Stallone stars in Bullet to the Head, Warm Bodies will make a grab for the Twilight audience, and Al Pacino and Christopher Walken are Stand Up Guys.

'Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters' to lead late-January releases

It's pretty unusual to have two wide releases open over the weekend with minimal advance reviews. If you want a sign that January is Hollywood's dumping ground, this is it.

Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters (3,372 theatres), which may have the best title since Snakes on a Plane, will likely come up first this weekend, with a projected weekend gross around $20 million. Originally scheduled to release last March, the pic will benefit slightly from increased
awareness of star Jeremy Renner. Since his breakout role in The Hurt Locker, he's appeared in The Avengers and The Bourne Legacy, making him more of a draw. Gemma Arterton plays Gretel in this tale, which posits that Hansel & Gretel grew up to seek vengeance (and collect bounty) on witches. If it sounds ridiculous, that's because Will Ferrell and Adam McKay are two of the producers, after which the idea starts to make more sense. "Lots of anachronisms and tongue-in-cheek
dialogue establish the spoofy nature of this violent venture. All
that’s missing is a genuine sense of wit," THR's Stephen Farber reports.

Movie 43 (2,023 theatres) also moved around release dates a number of times before settling for the January doldrums. The cast includes dozens of big names ranging from Seth MacFarlane to
Kate Winslet, with many pitching in on writing and directing. The spoof comedy should get close to $10 million, but could be hurt by the scattered impressions of what this comedy actually is.

Parker (2,224 theatres) is the sole new wide release that screened more than a day in advance for most critics. There may be a reason for that: our critic Daniel Eagan raves that the role of Parker, a character in Donald Westlake novels, "fits action star Jason Statham like a glove." The pacing is also top-notch. "The first hour has a propulsive energy that has
been sadly missing from recent thrillers," Eagan declares, and a lag afterwards is redeemed by a "climactic heist and showdown."
However good Statham is in his action movies, they've been opening below $10 million lately, and a similar debut is expected for Parker.

With so many good movies from December now expanding their release, allowing viewers from all over the country to finally catch them in their hometown, there isn't much new product. However, Music Box Films will release the documentary Happy People: A Year in the Taiga, which Werner Herzog re-edited and narrated from a Russian film, and then taking a co-directing credit for his work. I recommend the movie as "a welcome antidote for coddled city dwellers who need a reminder that humanity survived before Internet connections," although I don't care if you eventually see it on Netflix instead of in a movie theatre.

 On Monday, we'll see if any of the three new wide releases exceeded their modest projections, and if any Oscar contenders picked up steam from the box office.