COENS, PERRY TOP BOX OFFICE

By Sarah Sluis

After weeks with nothing to see, America turned out in force to catch four new wide releases, placing them #1-#4 at the box office.

Burn After Reading claimed the top spot with $19.4 million, creating an opening weekend record for the duo.  True, many of their films have opened in limited release and racked up the millions more slowly, but this nevertheless represents a victory for the Coens, who were able to roll over the critical success they achieved with No Country for Old Men into box office dollars for their current film.

Not far behind, Tyler Perry's The Family that Preys finished at #2 with $18 million.  Perry's continued success�$250 million in box office on his past six films, with five of the six films opening at #1 or #2, and 11 million DVD sales�has made more people stand up and take notice.  By not screening his films for critics in advance, and targeting mainly African-American viewers, Perry's films have made it big at the box office without a similar splash in the media.  Expect more stories about Perry, as a $250 million track record is hard to hide.

Righteous Kill (#3, $16.5 million) and The Women (#4, $10 million) were both star-studded mediocre releases.  Neither was particularly well-reviewed, although I imagine they will both find their way into many people's Netflix queues.

The House Bunny surpassed Tropic Thunder this week ($4.3 million to Tropic's $4.1 million), actually adding 27 theatres to its run.  Female-oriented films are known for opening small but lasting for several weeks as they gain word-of-mouth, and this film definitely speaks to that point.

Lastly, that incendiary film Towelhead had the highest per-screen average for the week, earning $13,250 per screen (with only four locations playing the film).  In terms of per-screen averages, Tyler Perry's The Family that Preys trailed at second with $8,705 per screen.  Choosing a wide but selective release of 2,070 locations was undoubtedly a smart move and certainly reflects the niche-to-mainstream position of Perry's films in the marketplace.