This weekend past, North American audiences bore witness to a battle for the ages. In one corner, time manipulating super-soldier Tom Cruise, decked out in a futuristic mech-suit loaded with really effing big guns. In the other corner, a 55-kg girl suffering from cancer, blessed with the powers of Kleenex. Guess who won?
Yes, it is quite clear that US audiences love crying far more than they do blowing up aliens, as the Shailene Woodley starring romantic-drama Fault In Our Stars exceeded expectations by opening with a really strong $48.2 million haul this weekend (and based on the fact that the feature film adaptation of John Greene’s novel only cost $17 million makes it even more impressive).
Despite opening on the back of incredibly positive reviews almost across the board (it’s currently the 4th highest rated movie, Tom Cruise’s new sci-fi action vehicle, the Doug Liman directed Edge of Tomorrow, got beat not just by weepy teenage romance but also Angelina Jolie’s cheekbones in Maleficent and had to settle for third place with earnings of just $29.1 million. That is definitely not a bad opening at all, but is off the pace of Cruise’s last sci-fi foray, Oblivion. The additional chart topping $82 million it picked up on the global scene should help to put it’s $175 million price tag in the black though (though it would probably need to rack up about $400 million total to break even with promotional costs as well, which is admittedly a pretty tough ask).
Here’s a look at how the rest of the box office did on a quiet weekend:
- The Fault In Our Stars – $48.2 million
- Maleficent – $35.5 million
- Edge of Tomorrow – $29.1 million
- X-Men: Days of Future Past – $14.7 million
- A Million Ways To Die In The West – $7.1 million
- Godzilla – $5.9 million
- Neighbors – $5.2 million
- Blended – $4 million
- Chef – $2.6 Million
- Million Dollar Arm – $1.8 million
The biggest top ten departure this week was The Amazing Spider-Man 2 which may have taken a few good sprays of critic doom, but still managed to swing out on a global total of $697 million. Clearly, doing whatever a spider can includes making lots of money. And the same can be said for the combo of Cameron Diaz, Leslie Mann and Kate Upton, as The Other Woman may have finally dropped off the top ten after 6 weeks, but not before notching up an impressive $176 million internationally, from just a $40 million price tag.
Last Updated: June 9, 2014
