Super 8 surprised a lot of people by the strength of its North American debut over the weekend. Few box office analysts would have projected the $38m four-day launch, including previews, heading into last weekend, partly because the movie's distributor Paramount honoured JJ Abrams's wish to keep things mysterious. Had Super 8 cost more to make than the reported $50m pricetag, I'll bet the studio would have been a little less eager to participate in the ploy.
To their credit they mounted a subdued, atmospheric marketing campaign, albeit one that didn't require a huge leap of imagination to guess the early surprise in the story. Remember, Abrams, the creator of TV sensation Lost and director of Star Trek and Mission: Impossible III, is an acolyte of Steven Spielberg and arguably his spiritual heir, so a timely homage to ET won't go astray. Spielberg produced Super 8 alongside Abrams and Bryan Burk.
The studio appeared to waver last week. It pulled a stunt to get things going and hooked up with Twitter for a day of preview screenings. That session brought in around $1m; Paramount knew that if people liked the movie at that stage they could say more in 140 characters or less than any billboard could. The US critics, by and large, loved Super 8. What's of note is that this is the first live-action movie that comes from an original screenplay and is not part of a franchise to lead the charts this summer. I suspect this is the reason why so many anticipated its failure at the box office. But it's here now.
X-Men: First Class dropped off around 55% in ticket sales in the second weekend, which these days is not too shabby, especially during the brutal summer season when at least one blockbuster opens every week. The film, which is Matthew Vaughn's latest directorial outing, has earned $98.9m for Fox after two weekends in release and will cross $100m on Monday. The Hangover Part II and Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides both soared past the $200m mark. The Hangover Part II has grossed about that much outside the US, too, while Pirates 4 is a titan on $678m. It's about to become Disney's biggest movie internationally when it overtakes the $690m benchmark set last year by Alice in Wonderland.
On a different scale, it's great to see Michael Winterbottom's The Trip get a release across the pond through IFC Films. Sharp comedy fans will be familiar with Steve Coogan, albeit not in the way he would like. Anthony Lane in the New Yorker, while appreciative of his gifts, references Coogan's small roles in Tropic Thunder and The Other Guys, which says it all. Hopefully they'll enjoy getting to know Rob Brydon. It's made peanuts so far – $84,600 from six theatres – and the real play will be on IFC's VoD channel.
North American top 10, 10-12 June 2011
1 Super 8, $37m. Total: $38m
2 X-Men: First Class, $25m. Total: $98.9m
3 The Hangover Part II, $18.5m. Total: $216.6m
4 Kung Fu Panda 2, $16.6. Total: $126.9m
5 Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides, $10.8m. Total: $202.8m
6 Bridesmaids, $10.1m. Total: $123.3m
7 Judy Moody and the NOT Bummer Summer, $6.3m
8 Midnight in Paris, $6.1m. Total: $14.2m
9 Thor, $2.4m. Total: $173.6m
10 Fast Five, $1.7m. Total: $205.1m
