Sunday, April 05, 2009

Fast Break

Are you sure the blockbuster Summer movie season hasn't already started...?

Fast & Furious won the weekend with boffo box office leaving all competition in its dust....




Pamela McClintock and Dave McNary of Variety:

Universal's "Fast and Furious" tore past naysayers and critics to score the biggest domestic opening since "The Dark Knight," grossing $72.5 million from 3,461 runs largely on the strength of Hispanic moviegoers and younger men.

Propelling the once-faltering franchise to new heights, opening was the best in U's history, as well as the biggest in April ever.

Overseas, the Vin Diesel-Paul Walker starrer rolled out in its first 32 territories, grossing $30.1 million from 3,158 runs for a worldwide tally of $102.6 million.

That wasn't quite good enough to overtake DreamWorks Animation/Paramount 3-D toon "Monsters vs. Aliens," which won the weekend crown at the international B.O. Playing in far more locations, family pic grossed $34.2 million from 6,991 in 43 markets for a foreign cume of $47.7 million.

In North America, "Monsters" fell 44% in its second weekend to $33.5 million from 4,109 screens; 10-day cume is $105.7 million. Buoyed by the premium charge for 3-D tickets, worldwide haul is $153.4 million.

Domestic box office was up an astounding 75%-80% over the same weekend last year. Frame's only other wide entry was Miramax's "Adventureland," which opened to an estimated $6 million from 1,862, in line with expectations. Dramedy was directed by Greg Mottola ("Superbad").


Joshua Rich of EW:

In the first truly shocking box office result of the year, Fast & Furious sped away from expectations to gross a humongous $72.5 mil, according to early estimates from Media by Numbers...

Can you say Fast/Furious 5...

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