‘Stars’ shines over weekend b.o.

The Fault in Our Stars had a successful, if front-loaded, opening weekend, easily besting Disney’s Maleficent and fellow new release Edge of Tomorrow.  Stars scored $48 million to earn the first-place slot at the box office.  The film enjoyed one of the most successful bows for a romance in years, besting past hit The Vow, which opened to $41.2 million in 2012. It did fall several million shy of the opening-weekend gross managed by lead Shailene Woodley’s last film, Divergent ($54 million), but, given the blockbuster production of that YA actioner, the comparison is not altogether fair. Stars is nothing less than a win for Fox.

As expected, the movie’s audience was overwhelmingly female (82 percent) and young (79 percent under 25). The rabid fanbase for TFIOS the book turned out in droves for a special pre-screening event, The Night Before Our Stars, on Thursday, as well as for the official opening night on Friday. In fact, Friday ticket sales accounted for an incredible $26 million of the movie’s total weekend gross. Business dropped 52 percent on Saturday, which makes the opening-weekend performance of The Fault in Our Stars one of the most front-loaded of all time. Although viewers liked the film, awarding it an “A” CinemaScore grade, such a precipitous drop its second day in theatres portends a series of steep drop-offs in the weeks ahead. Many pundits see a final tally around $100 million or so.

Holdover Maleficent continued to weave a spell over crowds and their wallets. The movie held well its second weekend in theatres, dropping 52 percent to earn $33.5 million. The live-action reimagining of the “Sleeping Beauty” fairytale has so far grossed $127.4 million, and should leave theatres with roughly $200 million to its name.

In third place, Tom Cruise vehicle Edge of Tomorrow couldn’t spin critical acclaim into b.o. gold, earning an OK $29.1 million. That’s a far cry from Cruise’s last alien-creature feature Oblivion, which opened to over $37 million. Perceived similarities to Oblivion may be partly to blame for Tomorrow’s lackluster performance – that, and the steady dip in popularity the Cruise Movie Star brand has suffered in recent years. International audiences, however, have yet to abandon Cruise. They helped make Tomorrow a worldwide success: The film earned $82 million overseas.

X-Men: Days of Future Past and A Million Ways to Die in the West rounded out the weekend’s top 5, with the former grossing $14.7 million (its total currently stands at $189.1 million) and the latter raking in $7.2 million, a 57 percent drop from last week. At this point, prospects for the Seth MacFarlane comedy look dim – the movie probably won’t make it to or past $50 million.