Kids’ stuff and romantic comedies are still gold with U.S. audiences.
After a week at number two, How to Train Your Dragon returned to its position as number one at the U.S. movie box office. Last week’s narrow winner, Kick-Ass, dropped rather precipitously to number five, falling off of the previous week’s number by 52 percent.
Surging in to the number two slot during its first week of release was The Back-Up Plan, a romantic comedy starring Jennifer Lopez, bringing in $12.2 million while Dragon snagged $15.o mil. Another romcom, Date Night, continued its steady appeal and came in third, grabbing an estimated $10.6 million.
One might suppose that a multitude of U.S. males got dragged to watch Lopez cavort in her comedy, as the flashy action film The Losers opened at fourth with only $9.6 million, well below what industry insiders had expected. The Losers audience was 60 percent male, however, whereas The Back-Up Plan viewership was 71 percent female.
Either much of The Losers audience put it off to catch up with Kick-Ass in the latter’s second week, or its appeal is simply more limited than expected. Could the film’s title be holding it back? Irony is not often a great draw for young males, especially those likely to plunk down a sawbuck for an action movie.
The appropriateness of the title of The Losers notwithstanding, audiences await the onrush of blockbusters such as Iron Man 2, lower-budget films are doing quite all right.
We should also give some credit to two little comedy engines that could: Hot Tub Time Machine and Why Did I Get Married Too? Both these films are still chugging along, at 11th and 13th, respectively, and have brought in $45.7 million and $57.5 mil to their respective studios and distributors.