‘I Can Do Bad’ Tops Pitiful Box-Office Weekend

Man down, so we’ll just give you the basics here. You know last week we said fall began with a whimper, and it did artistically, but box-office wise, $48 million for an opening weekend turd like “The Final Destination” is really nothing to sneeze at. Similarly, this weekend was largely barren of quality of any kind, but the films still raked in some surprisingly decent money.

It’s not much of a weekend worth parsing really, but we suppose Tyler Perry still shows that he has a core audience out there (African-Americans!) who will go out to see his movies in full force and put him at the top of the box-office pretty much on every outing. Lionsgate is smart about it too, they always pick the lowest competition weekends (dumping ground season in early January or late August/early September) and they seem to score every time.

As much as these films don’t tend to generally interest movie bloggers like us or cinephiles of any kind really, they do have that built-in audience that is not going away. Good for Perry, really. Just don’t ask us to go out and see any of them ever.

“Inglourious Basterds” has been in the top 5 for what, three weeks now? Not bad and it’s finally passed the $100 million mark in the U.S. But it was an expensive movie to make and promote so we’re not sure if it’s turned a profit quite yet, at least via domestic numbers. Though it’s at what, $188 million worldwide? That’s pretty great. But whether it makes money or not in the books, the film has been viewed as a success and perception is all that really matters. Ang Lee’s “The Hulk” was considered a bomb and Louis Leterrier’s version was seen as a hit, but when all was said and done the reboot barely topped the original at the U.S. box-office. So the Tarantino business is now seen as good business, which is good for him considering “Grindhouse” was seen as a flop. Perception. It’s all about perception.

Sandra Bullock’s semi-impregnable box-office track record (“The Proposal” has made an astounding $161 million domestically and $271 million in total worldwide) has taken a bit of a hit, only $5.8 million this weekend, but with $21 million in total, and a presumably low budget, this thing slowly, but surely will reach $30 or $35 million, likely making its money back. Somehow, “The Final Destination” has amassed $58.3 million so we’ll likely see a fourth film at some point (they might have announced it already and we just didn’t give a rat’s). The abysmal-looking “Sorority Row” and “Whiteout” could barely pass the $5 million mark despite both of them being on more than 2,600 screens. That’s pitiful really, but also perhaps a small miracle that audiences rejected this sort of crap. Why Kate Beckinsale, who can be a real actress when she wants to be and started out as one, continues to take on crap like this is mind boggling. Presumably she’s already set for life, so why in hell does she keep taking these paycheck gigs? Either that or her agent sucks and she has no taste.

The real story of the box-office weekend continues to be “District 9” and “Julie & Julia.” The former crossed the $100 million mark last weekend and continues to make money in the box-office top 10 and the latter has been in the top 10 since the beginning of August and has accumulated $85.3 million and that makes it pretty much a bonafide hit considering it cost much less to make and promote. The female audience is generally disregarded by studios, but they’re really all about the longtail tortoise and hare game, going out to the movies when they can, feeling no major rush to bombard the box-office opening weekend and when they respond to a picture it shows. Finally bumped out of the top 10 is another female-oriented pic, “The Time Traveler’s Wife,” that wasn’t seen as a hit, but slowly sucked up almost $60 million in five weeks.

The action flick, “Gamer” took in $16 million after two weeks which must be seen as a bomb, considering how much the geek audience was on about it earlier this year. Gerard Butler probably needs to get a new agent stat. Other numbers of note, “Halloween II” seems to have already maxed out at the box-office with $20, “Shorts” has slowly crawled to almost $20 million, “Extract” is at $8.6 million and “(500) Days of Summer” still has to be seen as the limited release film of the summer — of the year? — having hoovered up $30 million in total, once again proving when Fox Searchlight scores, they score pretty big (not every flick is a hit though, see “Post-Grad,” etc.). We meant to write a graph about this shitty weekend. How we got this far? No clue.

1. “Tyler Perry’s I Can Do Bad All By Myself” – $24.0 million
2. “9” – $10.9 million (total $15.3 million)
3. “Inglourious Basterds” – $6.5 million (total $104.3 million)
4. “All About Steve” – $5.8 million (total $21.8 million)
5. “The Final Destination” – $5.5 million (total $58.3 million)
6. “Sorority Row” – $5.2 million
7. “Whiteout” – $5.1 million
8. “District 9 ” – $3.6 million (total $108 million)
9. “Julie & Julia” – $3.3 million – (total $85.3 million
10. “Gamer” – $3.1 million (total $16 million)