This week's box office featured a clear winner, but the battle for spots 2-5 was pretty close.
In at number 1 is Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2 (read our review) with a super-sized $35 million opening. As well, the food-centric sequel improved upon its predecessor's $30 million opening.
Admittedly, the film still has some ground to cover to make back its $78 million budget, but Cloudy 2 is certainly on the right track. It also holds the title of fourth best opening weekend for September.
Prisoners drops to the number 2 spot this weekend with $11.2 million, bringing its domestic total up to $38 million. Despite strong word of mouth, the film dropped a fairly substantial 45% from week 1 to week 2. Even so, Prisoners is still on pace to surpass its $46 million budget and then some.
Now in wide release, Rush (read our review) jumped up to the number 3 spot with $10.3 million, which brings its domestic total up to $10.5 million. Although Rush has the appeal of star Chris Hemsworth and director Ron Howard going for it, the Formula 1 racing subject matter may have been a tough sell to mainstream audiences. It seems pretty likely that the film will make back its $38 million budget, but above that it's hard to tell.
Coming in at number 4 is Baggage Claim (read our review) with $9.3 million. Although not as strong of an opening as previous romantic comedies, Baggage Claim still did well against its competition with a solid $4,558/screen average.
Joseph Gordon-Levitt's directorial debut, Don Jon (read our review), opens in the number 5 spot with $9 million. While not a huge opening weekend, Don Jon did better than some other directorial debuts, like Ben Affleck's Gone Baby Gone ($5 million) and Drew Barrymore's Whip It ($4 million). As a matter of fact, the film has already made back its $6 million budget. Mostly positive reviews combined with a solid opening leads us to believe there's a future in directing for this Gordon-Levitt fellow.
In at number 6 is Insidious Chapter 2 with $6.7 million. Now at $69 million to-date, Insidious 2 is director James Wan's second highest grossing film - behind his other 2013 release The Conjuring ($136 million). Those rankings will surely change come 2014, though, as Wan is helming the next entry in the extremely lucrative Fast and Furious franchise.
Falling to number 7 this weekend is The Family with $3.6 million. The Robert DeNiro action/comedy has now eclipsed its $30M budget with $31 million total.
Instructions Not Included is the number 8 film this weekend with $3.3 million. Although its numbers have tapered off a bit, the film is now the highest grossing Spanish-language film in the States (ahead of Pan's Labyrinth) and the fourth highest grossing foreign language film.
In at number 9 is We're the Millers with $2.8 million. The R-rated raunch-com is up to $142 million in domestic dollars.
Rounding out the top 10 is Lee Daniels' The Butler with $2.4 million. The Oscar-contending film is now up to $110 million.
Outside the top 10: the concert/narrative film Metallica Through the Never, which stars Amazing Spider-Man 2's Dane DeHaan, opened with $1.6 million on 305 screens.
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[NOTE: These are only weekend box office estimates - based on Friday and Saturday ticket sales coupled with adjusted expectations for Sunday. Official weekend box office results will be released on Monday, September 30th - at which time we'll update this post with any changes.]
Source: Box Office Mojo