A "Hostel" Takeover at Multiplex

The lion and the ape couldn't make it out of the Hostel alive.

The Quentin Tarantino-produced splatter flick scared up a better than expected $19.6 million to topple The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe and King Kong, which had been jostling each other in and out of the top slot for the past few weeks.

"I'm not surprised," said Paul Dergarabedian, president of box-office tracker Exhibitor Relations. "Horror films are like gold at the box office...audiences love to be scared and enjoy these types of films in the communal environment of the theaters."

The R-rated Lions Gate release, which reportedly cost less than $5 million to make, features a couple of American slackers (Jay Hernandez and Derek Richardson) whose Euro trip goes way bad. Opening at 2,195 sites, the gore-happy flick, directed by Cabin Fever's Eli Roth, averaged a slick $8,909 per screen.

"Eli Roth has once again delivered a horror film that is gory enough to delight hardcore horror fans and intelligent enough to attract wider audiences," stated Tom Ortenberg, president of Lions Gate.

"Clearly having Quentin Tarantino's stamp of approval didn't hurt at all," said Dergarabedian, noting that marketing materials played up the Kill Bill-Pulp Fiction director's role as executive producer and helped pull in the horror-loving young male demo.

(But those same young males failed to pay attention to the weekend's other new fright flick. The vampire videogame adaptation BloodRayne failed to suck in many fans, earning just $1.6 million by averaging an anemic $1,574 per 985 screens.)

Meanwhile, Narnia, last week's number one, fell 39 percent to $15.6 million in second place. After five weeks, the total domestic gross for Disney's adaptation of C.S. Lewis' classic fable is $247.8 million. Overseas, the film has grossed an addition $226.3 million.

King Kong, meanwhile, slipped 49 percent to land in third with $12.6 million. After four weeks, the total domestic gross for Peter Jackson's remake of the 1933 classic stands at $192.7 million--and should pass $200 million by next weekend. The gorilla has grabbed another $272 million abroad.

In fourth place Sony boasted "a great hold" for the Jim Carrey romp Fun with Dick and Jane. The studio claims the film is benefiting from good word of mouth, which would explain a dip of just 26 percent in its third week for $11.9 million. It has tallied $81.1 million.

Fox also proclaimed itself content with a couple of family-themed flicks still drawing. The Steve Martin-fronted sequel Cheaper by the Dozen 2 finished in fifth with $8.4 million (for a three-week total of $66.6 million) and The Family Stone was in 10th place with $4.6 million (for a four-week tally of $53.2 million)--enough to make studio distribution honcho Bert Livingston declare that the year was off to a strong start after an abysmal 2005. Per Exhibitor Relations, overall business from Friday-Sunday was up 8 percent from last year.

Fresh off Steven Spielberg's DGA nomination for Best Director, Universal expanded Munich into 1,485, up 953 sites from last week. The controversial drama was up 59 percent, averaging a solid $5,095 at 1,485 locations for $7.6 million for the weekend and $25.4 million total.

Also cashing in with a wider expansion was Brokeback Mountain. Featuring Oscar bait performances from Heath Ledger and Jake Gyllenhaal and helmed by another new DGA nominee, Ang Lee, the cowboys-in-love movie added 215 sites for a total of 484, where it averaged an excellent $11,856. Its $5.7 million weekend haul was up 58 percent from last week, climbing from 14th to eighth place. Brokeback has now lassoed $22.4 million in five weeks.

Ledger's other art-house hit, Casanova, gained 832 percent by grossing $3.8 million at 1,004 theaters (up 967 from last week) for an average of $3,764. The costume drama has earned $5 million in three weeks of limited release.

Also acing the competition was Woody Allen's Match Point. The Scarlett Johansson-starring romantic thriller added 296 sites to play at 304, where it averaged $9,243 for $2.8 million, a gain of 605 percent. The tennis-themed film has netted $3.7 million in two weeks.

Meanwhile, audiences just said no to the new stoner comedy Grandma's Boy. Fox didn't screen the movie for critics, never a good sign, and expressed little surprise that the Adam Sandler-backed flick averaged just $1,493 at 2,015 locations for $3 million.

On the flip side, ThinkFilm's Fateless, a fact-based tale of a teen's life in a Nazi concentration camp and Hungary's official Academy Award entry for Best Foreign-Language Film, did outstanding business at in extreme limited release. At just one location in New York, the film registered $12,680--a virtually full house--from its weekend screenings at the 150-seat theater.

Here's a look at the top-grossing films, based on final studio figures compiled by Exhibitor Relations:

1. Hostel, $19.6 million
2. The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, $15.6 million
3. King Kong, $12.6 million
4. Fun with Dick and Jane, $11.9 million
5. Cheaper by the Dozen 2, $8.4 million
6. Munich, $7.6 million
7. Memoirs of a Geisha, $6.1 million
8. Brokeback Mountain, $5.73 million
9. Rumor Has It..., $5.7 million
10. The Family Stone, $4.6 million

(Originally published Jan. 8, 2006 at 1:30 p.m. PT.)