Well, it looks like we have an answer to the question of whether or not audiences are interested in a historical, racially charged baseball movie. Brian Helgeland's '42' opened at the top of the box office this weekend, instantly breaking the record for biggest opening for a baseball movie. Sure, it's a minor record to break, but a record is a record.

FilmWeekendPer Screen
142$27,250,000$9.074$27,250,000
2Scary Movie 5$15,153,000$4,454$15,153,000
3The Croods$13,200,000 (-36.1)$3,578$142,524,000
4G.I. Joe: Retaliation$10,800,000 (-48.3)$3,055$102,426,000
5Evil Dead$9,500,000 (-63.1)
$3,140$41,500,000
6Jurassic Park 3D$8,820,000 (-52.6)$3,175$31,929,000
7Olympus Has Fallen$7,283,000 (-28.3)$2,481$81,890,000
8Oz the Great and Powerful$4,923,000 (-38.5)$1,966$219,444,000
9Temptation: Confessions of a Marriage Counselor$4,500,000 (-55.4)$2,493$45,422,000
10The Place Beyond the Pines$4,080,000 (+480.1)$7,983$5,455,000

 

With over $27 million in the bank, the Jackie Robinson biopic surpassed all expectations, trampling what everyone expected to be the big winner of the weekend (we'll get to that in a moment). While this is a nice opening, it's not an opening that guarantees that the film was ultimately be a massive success. It'll need endurance for that. However, word of mouth on the film seems to generally be rather positive, so it should hang around for awhile if the wind blows in the right direction.

In second place, 'Scary Movie 5' landed with a bit of a thud, taking in $15 million. While that's not awful for a film that was made for only $20 million, it's a far cry from the fourth film's $40 million opening seven years ago. When the dust clears, 'Scary Movie 5' will probably be in the black, but this is probably the last time we'll ever see a 'Scary Movie' in the theaters. However, we wouldn't be surprised if this series jumps straight to direct-to-video.

In third place, 'The Croods' continued to showcase some powerful legs, earning another $13 million for a $142 million gross. What can we say? Kids like neanderthals. Apparently. It should keep on trucking to the end of the month, but the arrival of Summer will banish it out of the top ten.

Below 'The Croods,' 'G.I. Joe: Retaliation' took in $10 million and crossed the $100 million mark. It's not clear if it'll have the legs to top the $150 million made by its predecessor (especially with 'Oblivion' coming out soon), but that's enough to make it a minor success.

Meanwhile, last week's champion, 'Evil Dead,' plummeted to fifth place, earning only $9.5 million for a $41 million total. Big drops are expected with horror movies, but 63% is number that truly stings a bit. Still, it's made its money back and everyone can walk away generally pleased (this is the kind of horror movie that never had huuuge numbers in its future, anyway). More surprising is the larger drop for 'Jurassic Park 3D,' which doesn't seem to have the legs of other 3D re-releases in recent years.

In the final stretch, 'Olympus Has Fallen' has its eyes on $100 million and it should be able to get there (but it may be cutting it close). 'Oz the Great and Powerful' has finally started to truly slow down, but it's still the highest grossing film of 2013 so far, so no one's complaining. 'Temptation: Confessions of a Marriage Counselor' took a sizable drop, but it's already made the money that it needs to make. Finally, 'The Place Beyond the Pines' had an impressive start in limited release, but we'll check back in with it once it expands.

Next weekend is all about Tom Cruise and 'Oblivion.' Sorry, other movies.

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