Weekend Box Office Report: May 1-3: The Box Office Cries Wolf

You can withdraw the claws, Hugh Jackman; X-Men Origins: Wolverine has done what it was supposed to do despite its widely publicized
leak online that has been reportedly downloaded over a million times since last
month.  You’ll be able to don those
muttonchops for years to come.

The first X-Man prequel carved out $87 million.  It may not have made Iron Man numbers
($98 million opening weekend) but it certainly did better than Fox thought it
would ($70 million).  Of course,
Fox was downplaying the numbers so as not to come in below expectations (as if
$70 million is some sort of paltry number).  They knew the success of Wolverine was pivotal.  Each previous X-movie had bested the
one before and launching into an origins series ensured possibilities for years
to come.  Not to mention,Wolverine is the official launch to the 2009 summer season.  No one wants to muck that up.  And with the Star Trek reboot coming next weekend, Fox had
to get in big now because there is no room to go any further. 

Working the talk show circuit hard this weekend didn’t pay
off for Matthew McConaughey and Jennifer Garner.  The ridiculous romantic comedy treatment of the classic
Dickens tale,Ghosts of Girlfriends Past tried for the same counter-programming
angle Made of Honor went with last year with similar results.  An average of under $5K per screen and
a ravishing by the critics pretty much ensures a disappearance as quick as a
ghost in the night next weekend.

Debuting with a per screen average nearly matching that of Wolverine, the latest Jim Jarmusch film,The Limits of Control brought in an
average of over $18K on just three screens.  Michael Keaton’s cinematic return, The Merry Gentlemen was
not so fortunate.  On 24 screens,
the film brought in just over $3K per screen for a grand total of $54K.  Still, that is nothing compared to the
12^th place finish of the two year old North American release of Battle for Terra.  Having premiered
at last year’s Tribeca Film Festival, Lionsgate released the eco-friendly film
on over 1000 screens and pulled less than $1000 on average.

NEXT WEEK: As previously mentioned, WOLVERINE takes on
Captain Kirk et al in Star Trek (3,500 screens).  Next Day Air, a movie about a package being wrongly
delivered comes out on the wrong weekend (1,000 screens).  Twilight vampire hottie, Robert
Pattinson gives us Little Ashes –  a little gay indie he made when he thought his career was going nowhere
(which explains the mustache).  And
Atom Egoyan releases his Cannes 2008 darling, ADORATION.

Weekend Top 10