"Collateral" Cruises

Tom Cruise made a killing this weekend.

The superstar's hit-man thriller Collateral debuted in the top slot on the movie charts this weekend, with a three-day haul of $24.7 million.

It was a solid, if not spectacular opening for the Michael Mann-helmed film in which Cruise turns bad as a contract killer who hijacks Jamie Foxx's cab for a murder spree across Los Angeles.

Limited somewhat by its R rating, the favorably reviewed DreamWorks release, reportedly budgeted at around $65 million, scored nowhere the gross of Cruise's PG-13 Mission: Impossible hits. In summer 1996, the first M: I earned $45.4 million its opening weekend, and in summer 2000, M:I-2 hauled in $57.8 million its first three days. Collateral also failed to beat the $25 million opening in December 2001 of Cruise's quirky R-rated mystery Vanilla Sky and only just appears to have beaten last December's R-rated historical epic The Last Samurai, which debuted with a disappointing $24.3 million.

However, Collateral did attract a quarter of the audience buying tickets over the weekend and averaged a fairly solid $7,748 at 3,188 sites. Its appeal was chiefly to more mature audiences, with 60 percent over 25, and it was a personal success for stylish director Mann, whose previous top opener had been Ali's $14.7 million in 2001.

Jim Tharp, DreamWorks head of distribution, told the Associated Press that given the strong reviews and good word of mouth, interest in the movie should hold up: "This one has the opportunity to continue to play. I don't think there's direction competition, especially for the older audience, until late September."

The weekend's other wide new release, Little Black Book, dogged by bad reviews, bombed in with just $7.1 million in fifth place. Sony's PG-13 rated romantic comedy, starring Brittany Murphy nosing through her boyfriend's personal files and misinterpreting the results, was only checked out by 7 percent of ticket buyers and averaged just $2,894 at 2,445 sites.

The weekend's top per-site average belonged to a limited release film with no-name stars but plenty of buzz. Open Water, Lions Gate's low-budget R-rated Sundance hit starring Daniel Travis and Blanchard Ryan as a couple of abandoned divers turned into shark bait, averaged a meaty $23,424 at just 47 sites for $1.1 million. Not bad for a film that cost about $100,000 to make.

Also in limited release, Code 46, an R-rated United Artists release starring Tim Robbins and Samantha Morton in a futuristic tale of unlikely romance in the era of cloning, averaged $6,723 at three sites for a total of $20,170.

Last week's number one, Disney's The Village virtually turned into a ghost town. M. Night Shyamalan's spooky tale lost its grip on audience imagination, dropping a huge 68 percent to earn just $16.5 million in second place, bringing its two-week total to $85.6 million. Dropping less sharply--only 47 percent from third place to fourth--was Paramount's political thriller The Manchurian Candidate, which earned $10.3 million to bring its two-week total to $38 million.

Finally, Fahrenheit 9/11 dropped out of the top 10 to 11th place, where the controversial Bush-bashing documentary earned another $1.9 million at 1,009 sites, bringing its seven-week gross to $113.3 million.

Overall it was a down weekend. The top 12 films grossed just $97.9 million, down 31 percent from last weekend, and 23 percent from this time last year when S.W.A.T headlined the chart.

Here's a recap of the top 10 films based on final studio figures compiled by Exhibitor Relations:

1. Collateral, $24.7 million
2. The Village, $16.5 million
3. The Bourne Supremacy, $14.4 million
4. The Manchurian Candidate, $10.5 million
5. Little Black Book, $7.1 million
6. I, Robot, $6.5 million
7. Spider-Man 2 , $5.4 million
8. Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle, $3.2 million
9. Catwoman, $2.9 million
10. A Cinderella Story, $2.88 million

(Originally published Aug. 8, 2004 at 12:20 p.m. PT.)