'Total Recall' takes second place to 'Dark Knight Rises'

As predicted, Total Recall placed second to The Dark Knight Rises this weekend, earning $26 million to the final Batman film's $36.4 million. Total Recall is a remake of the 1990 film starring California's former governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger. My expectations for a remake of such a well-known original weren't that high, but other remakes/relaunches have had impressive debuts. Think of the remake of The Karate Kid, which debuted to $55 million and totaled $176 million. Or last year's Rise of the Planet of the Apes, which had a near-identical performance, opening to $54 million and finishing with $176 million (but earning twice as much abroad, over $300 million). Sony is probably less focused on domestic totals and more on international ones. This is the kind of project that translates well internationally, so the distributor should expect to see even stronger returns abroad as it starts to roll out in more foreign markets.

Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Dog Days of Summer, the third in the adaptation of kid's books, opened to a less-than-stellar $14.7 million. This entry opened in August in order to match up with the movie's summer setting, but that may have hurt the movie's opening. The first two film chose a March "Spring Break" timeslot, opening to $22 and $24 million. Star Zachary Gordon filmed both Dog Days and the prior movie back to back last year in a battle to outrun puberty, so even without these box office results, this may be the final entry in the series.

Within the top ten, Ted posted the strongest hold, dipping just 26% to finish with $5.4 million in its fifth week. That was enough to tip the R-rated comedy past the $200 million mark. Beasts of the Southern Wild rose from thirteenth to twelfth place, posting a 26% gain as it added 110 theatres for a total of 318 locations. It was one of thirteen specialty releases to post gains this weekend. The highest-earning of the bunch included Versailles-set Farewell My Queen, which went up 40% for a total of $186,000, and Killer Joe, which expanded from three to fourteen locations and brought home $163,000 in the process, a 330% increase from its debut.

Un-rom-com Celeste and Jesse Forever averaged $28,000 per screen in its opening in four locations. That puts the Rashida Jones-Andy Samberg picture in a strong position for expansion. Magnolia's 360 had a softer opening, averaging $6,300 per screen in two locations. That release is also opening on-demand so it's likely the use of multiple platforms will bolster returns.

This Wednesday, the empty nester sex-and-relationship comedy Hope Springs will get a head start on the weekend. On Friday, the Will Ferrell-Zach Galifianakis political comedy The Campaign will open opposite The Bourne Legacy, the first of the franchise without Matt Damon in a starring role.

'Ted' mines comedy gold with surprise $54 million weekend

Nearly doubling industry estimates, Ted scored big with a $54.1 million gross this weekend. In comparison, 2009's The Hangover debuted to $44 million. That means Ted has set the new record for an opening of a non-sequel, R-rated comedy. Not only did it earn a lot of money, audiences gave it an A- CinemaScore. I'm sure Universal will want to follow up this comedy's $50 million weekend with a sequel, so there may be a Ted 2 a couple of summers from now.

For the first time ever, two R-rated comedies opened above $20 million. Magic Mike beat that figure by a lot, earning $39.1 million crumpled one-dollar bills in just three days. Channing Tatum stars as a male stripper with big dreams in this Steven Soderbergh-directed flick, which appears to have delighted both critics (78% positive on Rotten Tomatoes) and audiences. Both Ted and Magic Mike are set up for strong follow-up weekends thanks to the Fourth of July holiday.

Most expected Disney's Brave to spend a second weekend in first place, but instead the feature dropped 48%, on the high side for animated movies. That left the princess movie with $34 million over the three-day period. Still, with kids out of school this feature will perform well on weekdays. In fact, it's already earned double its opening weekend (for a total of $134 million) due to strong performance Monday through Thursday.

In fourth place, Tyler Perry's Madea's Witness Protection grabbed $26.2 million, also on the high side of expectations. Lionsgate reported that Perry's audiences are normally 80% black, but the casting of Eugene Levy and Denise Richards made the comedy more of a crossover hit, with the figure plateauing at 70%. One thing remained the same. Perry's pictures are beloved by females, who represented around 70% of the audience.

Squeaking into tenth place, the family drama People Like Us earned just $4.3 million. Audiences gave it a so-so B rating in exit polls.

Critical darling Beasts of the Southern Wild averaged $42,000 per screen in four locations over the weekend, a robust start for the Louisiana-set tale.

Moonrise Kingdom, which made a national, 854-screen push, brought in $4.8 million. This made the Wes Anderson-directed film his second-highest grossing feature to date. The Royal Tenenbaums earned $52 million in 2001.

Tomorrow, The Amazing Spider-Man will get a head start on Fourth of July crowds. The 3D concert doc Katy Perry: Part of Me will follow on Thursday, and Oliver Stone's Savages will open on Friday.

R-rated 'Ted' and 'Magic Mike' aim for adult fun

Earlier this summer, just one wide release was opening every weekend. This week there are four. Each of these 2,000 to 3,000-screen releases, however, will have a hard time beating last weekend's Brave, which is in release on over 4,000 screens. The animated Pixar film opened to $66 million, so even a 50% drop will leave it above $30 million.

Ted (3,239 theatres) has the widest release of the bunch. I attended the screening with a Seth MacFarlane fan who was disappointed with the "Family Guy" creator's feature writing/directing debut. The fantasy concept of a foul-mouthed teddy bear and his adult best friend is pulled off with ease. The big surprise is that the comedy feels like a conventional rom-com, albeit with a talking teddy bear as the third wheel and romantic obstacle. FJI's Michael Sauter was more receptive to the "comedy, [which] wants to simultaneously shock, delight and knock you a little bit sideways," and predicts it will be a "smashing success." If its predicted opening in the high $20 millions counts, Ted may be just that.

Channing Tatum was actually a male stripper, and probably a good one too. He shows off his impressive dance skills and flips in Magic Mike (2,930 theatres). Steven Soderbergh directs the dance-fueled drama, which has received generally good notices from critics. FJI's David Noh disagrees. Except for Tatum, he wasn't intrigued by the dancers or their moves, and feels the whole movie has a "strange lack of sexiness." Cinema Blend's Katey Rich came out positively for the feature, noting that with its message "about dreams that curdle and get deferred, about how you need more money than what's stuffed in a G-string to make it in this world, but how those $1 bills can make it easier to wait" could have been "disastrous when combined," but "Soderbergh makes it look easy." During Thursday midnight screenings, Ted earned $2.6 million and Magic Mike $2.1 million, so both R-rated flicks are set to perform well over the course of the weekend.

A man finds out he has a half-sister after his father's passing in People Like Us (2,055 theatres). "Enough honest hurt pokes through to make it impossible to dismiss the film outright," FJI critic Daniel Eagan says of the "sentimental" film featuring soul-baring that's "simultaneously moving and manipulative." With a kind of generic premise and not a lot of marketing support, it could be tough for this drama to even crack $10 million.

Tyler Perry's signature funny grandma character returns in Madea's Witness Protection (2,161 theatres). Audiences have slightly tired of Perry's outings lately, but loyal fans should bring the comedy's opening above $20 million. The recession-influenced tale includes a church that was ripped off by duplicitous investors, a ripped-from-the-headlines premise that could pull in additional viewers.

Sundance prizewinner Beasts of the Southern Wild (4 theatres) opened on Wednesday, when it earned $6,700 per screen. That's not particularly high, but the weekend will be the true test for the unusual, expressionistic drama. Some are saying its box-office target will be similar to the one for Terrence Malick's The Tree of Life, another Fox Searchlight release which ended up with $13 million last summer.

Also in the specialty mix this weekend is Take This Waltz (2 theatres), an unwieldy exploration of a love triangle that left me with mixed feelings. I found most of the film boring but really liked the ending (when it finally happened). Moonrise Kingdom expands to 854 theatres this weekend. I've seen plenty of TV ads supporting the expansion, which I predict will unfold quite well for the strongly-performing release.

On Monday, we'll see which of the four releases broke from the pack, and if Beasts' debut adds more momentum to its critical buzz.

'Ted' follows 'Beaver,' giving Hollywood a second stuffed animal movie

By Sarah Sluis

It's not unusual in Hollywood to see two films with similar ideas release within a year of each other. Scripts are passed around. People make pitches to multiple studios. Before you know it, someone who passed on a script sees it go into development�and worries they made the wrong decision. Quick! Let's make a movie about volcanoes (Dante's Peak/Volcano), animated insects (A Bug's Life/Antz), asteroids hitting the Earth (Armageddon/Deep Impact), or sea creatures (Shark Tale/Finding Nemo). And those are just the most egregious examples. Little bits of plot or characters or situations often appear in waves. It's one thing to riff on a successful part of a movie, but it's another thing to see studios developing a similar project concurrently. It feels a little bit like encroaching on someone else's intellectual property.

On Monday, it was announced that Universal is acquiring a hard-R comedy by "Family Guy" creator Seth MacFarlane called Ted, about a man and his teddy bear. This project sounds remarkably similar to a movie that just wrapped called The Beaver, which is about a man (Mel Gibson) who walks around with a beaver puppet on his hand that he treats like a living creature. The movie was at the top of the Black List of unproduced screenplays in 2008 (meaning everyone in Hollywood read it and liked it), and some time after pulled together its starry cast (Jodie Foster is directing and co-starring)

Some important differences: Ted will be a mixture of live action and CG, with MacFarlane voicing Ted. This means the audience will hear the voice of the stuffed animal, making it more real. As far as I know, the beaver in the other movie doesn't talk. Even if Ted the teddy bear is a delusion or an imaginary voice, the audience will have access to it and it will create a much different feel. A hard-R comedy is also quite different from a quieter black comedy with some drama in it, which is my impression of The Beaver.

Still, two movies about adults with stuffed animal companions? It's the kind of story idea that's so weird it takes a while to warm up to, but once you do, you kind of like it....and you're not the only one. While I hope it ends here, I will be on the lookout for the third stuffed animal-related project.