'Four Christmases' cheers up box office

By Sarah Sluis

Hollywood had a lot to be thankful for this weekend.  Grossing 4% more than last year's Thanksgiving

weekend, the box office showed no signs of recession.  Holiday picture Four Christmases came in at number one with a $31.6 million gross, but with the top seven films each earning at least $10 million, there was plenty of holiday cheer to spread around.  Bolt actually increased its take 1% from last week, earning $26.5 million for the weekend and proving that families sidetracked by Twilight would come back to see a reliably entertaining Disney picture.

Twilight finished at number three with $26.3 million, dropping 62%.  The spike downward does not necessarily spell a swift demise for the picture.  With winter break coming up, teen fans who saw the film in the opening weekend will have the chance to come back for repeat viewings and spread the word among their less devoted friends.

Australia finished on the low side, earning $14.8 million for the three-day weekend and $20 million for the five-day total.  Despite tracking highly among women over 25, the picture did not skew strongly towards that demographic, attracting equal amounts of men and women, and only a slight (65%) skew in audiences over 25 (i.e. people went with their families).  If this film is truly drawing a Nights of Rodanthe-type crowd, who didn't have the time to see the movie because of their turkey-basting duties, Australia will stick around through the holiday season and cross at least $50 million.  Working against the film, however, is that this film already received a huge push from Oprah a few weeks back, giving it plenty of time to work up anticipation among a crowd that relies heavily on word-of-mouth to make their moviegoing decisions.  Next weekend, which will have an open schedule with plenty of room to pick up audience members, will determine the box-office playability of Baz Luhrman's romantic epic.

Among specialty releases, Milk and Slumdog Millionaire both wowed audiences and the box office.  Milk earned an astounding $38,375 per theatre ($52,627 for the five-day holiday) in its debut, and third-weeker Slumdog's $27,890 per theatre prompted Fox Searchlight to announce that the film will expand to 600 theatres by December 19th.  Both of these films have received a healthy amount of Oscar buzz, and their robust ticket sales validate their potential as Academy Award contenders.

Full box office results available here.