By Chris Kavan - 12/27/10 at 09:37 AM CT
It looks like Hollywood has been naughty instead of nice as the 45% attendance decline was a nice lump of coal for the box office.
As the third film in the series, after a six-year hiatus, Meet the Fockers grabbed to top spot with $34 million over the weekend and a 5-day haul of $48.3 million. Not bad, unless you consider that the last outing, Meet the Parents, made $46.1 million over the weekend and opened with $70.5 million with nearly double the attendance.
The Coen brothers have to be a little more happy. Even through True Grit was only second place, the $25.6 million weekend and $36.8 million total represents a personal best opening for the duo and is also one of the best starts for a western. If the numbers hold it should easily pass the $53.6 million total of 3:10 to Yuma.
The audience gave a hearty Bah-Humbug! to the other new opening, as the Jack Black comedy Gulliver's Travels opened to a weak 7th-place $7.2 million opening - though to be fair it only played on Saturday-Sunday. Still, even with 3D, it was a disappointing return.
Tron Legacy dipped nearly 55% down to third with $20.1 million. It was a big hit, but for a niche film an $88.3 million total must be looking pretty good. In 4th place, and holding up the best with a 12% drop, was The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, which added an additional $10.8 million bringing its total to nearly $64 million.
Rounding out the top 5 was Yogi Bear, which also took a steep 46% decline to wind up with $8.8 million and $36.8 million total. While not quite cracking the top 10, The King's Speech still managed to pull in $4.5 million in roughly half the number of theaters as any other film. As it adds theaters, expect to see it in the top ten soon.
