Zombieland Leads the Pack, Whip It Stumbles

Published by Jeff Leins on: October 4th, 2009

Sony’s Zombieland, starring Woody Harrelson, lead the pack at the box office this weekend with an estimated $25 million.  The studio also held the second spot with strong holdover Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs earning $16.7 million in its third week.

Meanwhile, Michael Moore’s latest docu-comedy Capitalism: A Love Story had a weak start down with the underperforming girl-power movie Whip It.

The zombie comedy Zombieland is a huge success for the $23 million-budgeted first time feature of director Ruben Fleischer.  It’s also the biggest opening of Harrelson’s career (as headliner) and Sony Picture’s 6th first place finish of the year.  The movie benefited from positive word of mouth and 90% positive reviews from critics.

Disney’s double bill of Toy Story and Toy Story 2 in 3D made $12.5 million.  It’s good enough for third place, which is huge considering theaters could only manage three screenings a day of the Pixar classics.  The investment paid off, so I’d expect more 3-D re-releases on the way, including the already rumored return of Titanic.

The Ricky Gervais comedy The Invention of Lying debuted in fourth with $7.4 million.  It was Gervais’ first feature film as director, star, and writer.

Playing in roughly the same theaters was Drew Barrymore’s own directorial debut, Whip It, starring Ellen Page.  The sixth place $4.9 million weekend is a disappointment after promoting the movie at just about every outlet and staging massive sneak previews before its opening.  Maybe too many sneaks, I think.

Tying for the same spot was the expansion of Michael Moore’s new farce, Capitalism: A Love Story.  With its arbitrary subtitle and touchy subject (the bailout and recession) it made only $4.9 million on 962 screens.  Ironically people aren’t turning out for the movie because of their own financial crisis.  It may very well wind up being his least watched film of the decade.

Bruce Willis’ Surrogates flopped 51% to fifth and $7.3 million.  The cumulative is just over $26 million on a budget of $80M.  Ouch.

3-Day U.S. Weekend Estimates:
1. Zombieland  $25 million
2. Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs  $16.7 million
3. Toy Story/Toy Story 3D  $12.5 million
4. The Invention of Lying  $7.4 million
5. Surrogates  $7.3 million
6. Whip It  $4.9 million
7. Capitalism: A Love Story  $4.9 million
8. Fame  $4.8 million
9. The Informant!  $3.8 million
10. Love Happens  $2.8 million