Sunday, January 02, 2011

Nitty Gritty

Happy New Year Folks!

Little Fockers is 2011's first box office winner but it's True Grit that's making waves



Pamela McClintock of THR

Paramount's True Grit finished New Year's weekend with a dazzling domestic cume of $86.8 million, the best ever gross for the Coen brothers and upping the Western's profile as Oscar voters mull their choices.

True Grit is the big victor of the holiday session, which was otherwise soft for major studio releases. Costing a modest $38 million to produce, True Grit grossed an estimated $24.5 million from 3,083 theaters for the weekend to reach $86.8 million.

Previous best for Joel and Ethan Coen was Oscar winner No Country for Old Men, which cumed $74.2 million domestically.

True Grit came in No. 2 for New Year's weekend behind Universal's Little Fockers, which has turned in a softer-than-expected performance, even while topping the domestic box office chart.

Little Fockers grossed an estimated $26.3 million from 3,552 theaters for the weekend to jump the $100 million mark with a cume of $103.2 million. However, it is pacing well behind sequel Meet the Fockers, which earned $162.5 million during the same frame in 2004.

Universal says Little Fockers is on solid ground, and should gross $300 million worldwide. Universal co-financed the $100 million film with Relativity Media and Paramount.

Save for True Grit and other top awards contenders, the Christmas season has been a disappointment for Hollywood studios. Business over New Year's weekend was down a hefty 27% from last year, when Avatarand Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel, both from 20th Century Fox, did big biz.

Out-and-out losers of the 2010 holidays include Fox's 3D family adventure Gulliver's Travels, which grossed an estimated $9.1 million from 3,089 theaters to come in No. 8 for New Year's weekend. Pic's cume is $27.2 million.

Sony also stumbled with Christmas romantic comedy How Do You Know, which fell out of the top 10 last week. Pic's cume through Sunday was $25.1 million.

While it didn't become the breakout hit that Disney had hoped for, Disney's 3D Tron: Legacy was still the biggest grosser of the two-week holiday stretch. Tron placed No. 3 over New Years weekend at the domestic box office, grossing an estimated $18.3 million from 3,365 theaters for a cume of $130.9 million....


John Young of EW

Ben Stiller-Robert De Niro comedy wins duel with ''True Grit'' ($24.5M); ''King's Speech'' reaches top 10

Next Up: Nicolas Cage leads Dominic Sena's silly looking 14th century tale Season Of The Witch; Find out if Garrett Hedlund, Gwyneth Paltrow and Tim McGraw are Country Strong ....

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