'Resident Evil: Retribution' underwhelms at number one, 'The Master' breaks per-theatre records

The number one spot this weekend went to Resident Evil: Retribution, which came up with $21.1 million over the weekend. Even with that top ranking, this Resident Evil is the least
successful to date. Only the first movie opened lower than this installment, the fifth. Abroad, the sci-fi actioner is expected to do better, so perhaps Screen Gems can recover part of their $65 million budget there.

Finding Nemo 3D grabbed second place and $17.5 million. That's right on par with the re-release of Beauty and the Beast in 3D, but Disney had been hoping for something closer to The Lion King's 3D opening of over $30 million. Still, with minimal investment, and an upcoming sequel to start marketing for, this
release was a strategic win. Abroad, many 3D re-releases have been overperforming. It's unlikely this movie is going to have the success of, say, Titanic 3D in China, but in many emerging markets, consumers may not have even had a theatre near them to show the movie on the big screen a decade ago.

On the heels of its buzzworthy showings at the Toronto and Venice Film Festivals, The Master debuted to $730,000, a per-theatre average of $146,000. That beats indie competitor Moonrise Kingdom, which opened earlier this year to $130,000 per theatre. The Master also posted the highest average ever for a live-action movie. It's worth noting that the record is a per-theatre average, not the usual industry metric, per-screen average. A quick search reveals that at the ArcLight in Hollywood, CA, The Master is playing twenty-two times a day, while L.A.'s The Landmark is playing the Scientology-esque drama seventeen times a
day. With a 2 hour, 30 minute running time, that means director P.T. Anderson's movie is playing on three or four screens in each location.

Opening in twelfth place, the hedge fund thriller Arbitrage did well for its 197 locations, pulling in $2 million and a per-screen average of $10,500. In other words, it made what I hear is roughly the average compensation for a single hedge funder. Cheers!

The red state-leaning The Last Ounce of Courage picked up $1.7 million on a 1,407-screen release. The distributor, Rocky Mountain Pictures, may have opened the drama a bit on the wide side, but the low-budget movie won't need much to get in the black. Rocky Mountain's other release, 2016: Obama's America, added $2 million to its total by dropping just 38%.

This Friday, the box office picks up with four new wide releases. Clint Eastwood stars in the anti-Moneyball baseball movie Trouble with the Curve, and horror fans can check out Jennifer Lawrence in what will likely be her last low-rent role in the horror flick The House at the End of the Street. Rounding out the offerings is Dredd, a remake that is indeed related to Judge Dredd, and the crime drama End of Watch.