Weekend Box Office Report: October 31 – November 2 2014

By Kip Mooney • On • In News News 0

 

BOX OFFICE REPORT 

October 31- November 2, 2014(estimates from BoxOfficeMojo.com)

TOP 51. Nightcrawler ($10.9 million)2. Ouija ($10.9 million)3. Fury ($9.1 million)4. Gone Girl ($8.8 million)5. Book of Life  ($8.3 million)

Nightcrawler, Jake Gyllenhaal's sleazy reporter movie, slithered past the competition to narrowly take the top spot. Originally pegged for a smaller release, the studio took advantage of a wide-open weekend. Of course, only $9,000 separate it from last week's champ Ouija, so things could shift when the dust settles.

If estimates hold, that would be one of the rare independent studios to win a weekend. Open Road has twice before had a No. 1 movie. It previously hit the top with End of Watch, which also starred Jake Gyllenhaal, and The Grey in 2012. The studio is co-owned by two theater chains, but it's a lot smaller than major players like Universal, Sony, Disney, Fox, Warner Bros. and Paramount. 

The rest of the Top 5 was awfully familiar. Fury lumbered along, bringing its total to $60 million, while Gone Girl continued to be the biggest success of the fall so far. The Book of Life enjoyed a slight drop, thanks to the timing of Halloween (Oct. 31) and Day of the Dead (Nov. 1). It's now made $40 million. 

rts who reunite 20 years later. Maybe we'll get a reprieve from these dull, repetitive flicks?

Outside the top 5: - This Weekend's Indie Champ: Birdman made it three in a row, averaging $10,866 on 231 screens.

- Things weren't so good for the other movies hoping to scare up some Halloween-themed box office. Before I Go to Sleep only made $2 million on about 1,900 screens. A 10th anniversary re-release of Saw had a truly hellish opening, taking in only $650,000 on more than 2,000 screens. And Daniel Radcliffe's horror comedy Horns only managed $104,000 on around 100 screens.

- The horror movie having the most impressive October was actually Annabelle, a spin-off of The Conjuring. It's made $82.5 million on a budget of just $6.5 million. Take that, Dracula reboots and board game adaptations!

Next week: Our first big showdown as we get into the holiday season. Christopher Nolan's space epic Interstellar takes on Disney's Big Hero 6, the first Marvel comic to get a big-screen animated adaptation. While animated movies"”especially ones from Disney"”do well, especially long term, Interstellar's going to have a huge opening weekend. While it doesn't have the brand recognition of the Batman movies or the "I've never seen anything like this" factor of Inception, it should be an easy $70 million, with Big Hero 6 doing more than $50 million.

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About Kip Mooney

Kip Mooney
Like many film critics born during and after the 1980s, my hero is Roger Ebert. The man was already the best critic in the nation when he won the Pulitzer in 1975, but his indomitable spirit during and after his recent battle with cancer keeps me coming back to read not only his reviews but his insightful commentary on the everyday. But enough about a guy you know a lot about. I knew I was going to be a film critic—some would say a snob—in middle school, when I had to voraciously defend my position that The Royal Tenenbaums was only a million times better than Adam Sandler’s remake of Mr. Deeds. From then on, I would seek out Wes Anderson’s films and avoid Sandler’s like the plague. Still, I like to think of myself as a populist, and I’ll be just as likely to see the next superhero movie as the next Sundance sensation. The thing I most deplore in a movie is laziness. I’d much rather see movies with big ambitions try and fail than movies with no ambitions succeed at simply existing. I’m also a big advocate of fun-bad movies like The Room and most of Nicolas Cage’s work. In the past, I’ve written for The Dallas Morning News and the North Texas Daily, which I edited for a semester. I also contributed to Dallas-based Pegasus News, which in the circle of life, is now part of The Dallas Morning News, where I got my big break in 2007. Eventually, I’d love to write and talk about film full-time, but until that’s a viable career option, I work as an auditor for Wells Fargo. I hope to one day meet my hero, go to the Toronto International Film Festival, and compete on Jeopardy. Until then, I’m excited to share my love of film with you.

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