1. Magic Mike - $41.5m ($14,164 PTA)
2. Brave - $34m (-48.7%)
3. Ted - $33m ($10,188 PTA)
4. Tyler Perry's Madea's Witness Protection - $24.8m ($11,476 PTA)
5. Madagascar 3: Europe's Most Wanted - $11.9m (-39.6%)
6. Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter- 7m (-57.1%)
7. People Like Us - 5.4m ($2,628 PTA)
8. Prometheus - $5.1m (-48.5%)
9. Snow White & The Huntsman - $4.5m (-44.3%)
10. Marvel's The Avengers - $4.2m (-41.5%)
The contest for #1 should be tight this weekend, between Pixar's holdover, Brave, and two very different kinds of R-rated comedies. Two other openers, a new Madea movie and a Chris Pine/Elizabeth Banks romantic dramedy, are also entering the spotlight. Will either one be able to shine?
First, we have Magic Mike, Steven Soderbergh's unconventional dramedy about male strippers (The film is given a hard R rating, of course) starring Channing Tatum and Alex Pettyfer. The Vow and 21 Jump Street have made Tatum more popular than ever before, and his name (and body, for that matter) will draw a lot of people to the movies, especially women. The film is even dominating fandango sales with more than 50% of tickets sold and twitter buzz ratings. With no female oriented film since What To Expect When You're Expecting, this could end up breaking out and topping the box office.
Ted, the directorial debut of Seth McFarlane of Family Guy and American Dad fame, brings McFarlane's crude humor to the big screen, telling the story of a man (Mark Whalberg) who lives with a talking stuffed teddy bear. (voiced by McFarlane himself) With positive reviews and a definite level of buzz since the trailer came out in early April, this R-rated comedy should have no problem at the box office, especially if the numerous fans of Family Guy come out for this. Bad Teacher numbers are a good barometer for this, but it could probably go even higher.
Tyler Perry's 10th film is roughly 6 years, Madea's Witness Protection, is just that: Tyler Perry putting on drag once more. Madea's Big Happy Family managed 25m on its opening weekend, but that's a bit dissapointing when compared with Madea Goes To Jail's 40m. However, Think Like A Man's breakout weekend back in April proved that there's still a big audience for such films. Due to the competition this weekend, though, Madea may struggle to definitely break out, but it should still perform decently. Expect something around BHF's numbers.
Finally, People Like Us is likely to be the runt of the litter. Chris Pine and Elizabeth Banks are certainly noteworthy stars, but they're probably not enough to draw big numbers into the theater. Combine that with minimal buzz and a low theater count, this may struggle to be a box office success. Decent reviews may help protect it from completely dying out, but for now, things aren't looking so good for this.
Brave had a solid opening weekend, right in line with last year's Cars 2. The difference is that the former will probably have a better hold, especially if no direct competition is opening. Still, the weekdays aren't showing amazing holds, but that's not really happening for anything. Expect a drop under 50%, but in line with how Toy Story 3 and WALL-E fared. Madagascar 3 should keep having consistent holds, and Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter will probably keep falling, due to the iffy word of mouth.
EDIT: Results Of Prediction - 90.47% (Me gusta.)
