Darren Aronofsky's Noah was the week's winner, coming in with an above average $44 million, which is pretty good, although the budget was $125 million and the studio will want it to hold on strongly to turn a profit. All the various controversies associated with the film seemed to help sustain interest in it, but it did get a bad "C" Cinemascore from audiences (we'll see if that means anything though, since we know how that worked out for Wolf of Wall Street last Christmas). With Easter coming up it may attract Christian audiences in a big way, if word of mouth isn't too bad in the end. In second place was Divergent, which fell just 51% from last week (a smaller drop than the Hunger Games and Twilight movies), and Muppets Most Wanted took third, also falling just a small amount, to pull in a decent $11 million for a $33 million total. It may hold on to make its budget back in the States, while scoring more overseas to turn a profit in the end.
Mr. Peabody and Sherman took fourth, on its way to a $100 million dollar total, while the real shocker of the weekend was God's Not Dead, which came in fifth but made another $9 million, exactly the same as its debut opening last week. This might turn out to be the big underdog success story of the year so far, as the movie's obviously playing very well in middle America.
Top 5:
- Noah- $44 million
- Divergent- $26.5 million
- Muppets Most Wanted- $11.3 million
- Mr. Peabody and Sherman- $9.5 million
- God's Not Dead- $9 million
In other news, Frozen just passed Toy Story 3 at the worldwide box office to become the biggest animated movie of all time with over $1 billion, and Wes Anderson's The Grand Budapest Hotel expanded nationally this weekend, coming in at No. 6 with $8.8 million, and well on its way to becoming Anderson's highest grossing film ever. Next week it's Captain America: The Winter Soldier, which has already made a hefty $75 million from overseas markets since opening on Wednesday, and is expected to do huge business here as well. See you then!
