'Precious' gold at the box office

By Sarah Sluis

The weekend was one for the record books. Opening in 18 locations, Precious: Based on the Novel 'Push' by Sapphire earned an unheard of $100,000 per location. Most strong specialty releases open between $10,000 and $25,000 per location. Last year's indie standout Slumdog Millionaire opened at $36,000 per location at ten engagements, which was considered an unusually high number. How did Precious bring in so much money? Every theatre played the movie between nine and fourteen times each day, devoting more than one screen to the movie. The movie opened in New York, Los Angeles (the two specialty release standards) as well as the Atlanta and Chicago metro areas. Executive producers Tyler Perry and Oprah Winfrey hail from these two cities, which also have robust African-American populations, so they were able to work off their strong local fan bases. Lionsgate has a huge hit on their hands, but scaling this release will still be tricky and require some deft handling to ride this incredibly strong wave of interest.

The number one film of the weekend was A Christmas Carol, which rang in the holiday season with a $31 million gross. With seven more weekends until Christmas, the movie will have plenty of time to share its Christmas cheer. The movie is also the largest 3D release to date, a welcome sign of exhibitors' progress in digital conversion.

The Men Who Stare at Goats opened at number three with $13.3 million, kicking off the fall and winter of George Clooney, who has two other films opening within the next month and a half (Fantastic Mr. Fox, Up in the Air)

The Fourth Kind ($12.5 million) drew in almost twice as many viewers as The Box ($7.8 million). It seems that The Fourth Kind registered as scarier than The Box, which is more of a convoluted thriller. The Fourth Kind also used vrit-type techniques, like hit Paranormal Activity, to tell its story.

In its second weekend, Michael Jackson's This Is It dropped 40% to $14 million. Its domestic and foreign total will easily clear the $60 million paid by Sony, which also has a stake in other Jackson-related material. Plus, the movie will stay in theatres beyond its planned two-week release, which will add to its profits.

After its spectacular wide release two weeks ago, Paranormal Activity settled down and dropped 47% to $8.6 million amidst the horror/sci-fi competition. Through the weekend, the movie's cumulative gross reached $97.4 million, a sure sign it will cross the $100 million mark within the week.

The films in the seventh to tenth spot of the top ten dropped a below-average amount. Couples Retreat dipped just .5%, Law Abiding Citizen fell 16%, and Where the Wild Things Are a slightly larger 28%, and Astro Boy 25%. Each of the films had something different to offer their audience than the new releases, so the lack of competition helps explain their above-average staying power.

This Friday, disaster romp 2012 will blanket the marketplace, while comedy Pirate Radio opens smaller, along with a four-location rollout of Wes Anderson's stop-motion animated Fantastic Mr. Fox.