"X-Men" Storms Box Office

Sun., Jul. 16, 2000 2:15 PM PDT by Bridget Byrne

Mutant mania makes for marvelous box office. Just ask X-Men, which clawed its way to an estimated $57.5 million to become the new number-one movie.

That huge gross made the superbeings' adventure the biggest July opener ever.

The on-screen conflict between Professor X's heroes and Magneto's villains drew crowds large enough to also make the movie the fourth highest-ever three-day opener, behind only a trio of sequels: The Lost World, The Phantom Menace and M:I-2.

Based on Stan Lee's Marvel Comics creations, which first materialized in 1963, this highly anticipated $75 million production explores the difficulties of racial tolerance. But that alone doesn't sell the popcorn. As director Bryan Singer says, the flick is also as "a kick-ass movie"--hence it's appeal to males, which made up about 65 percent of the audience.

It certainly booted aside all competition, dropping last week's big number one Scary Movie down 38 percent and allowing no other new movies to creep into the top 10.

Audiences flocked to check out the big-screen versions of their fave mutants, including Hugh Jackman's lupine Wolverine, Anna Paquin's psyche-sucking Rogue, Halle Berry's moody Storm, Patrick Stewart's telepathic X and Ian McKellen's power-hungry Magneto. The Fox release averaged $19,008 in 3,025 sites. In contrast, the jokey Scary Movie averaged $8,280 at 3,152 sites in second place. That $26.1 million brought the low-budget Dimension release's 10-day total gross to $89 million.

The rest of the top 10 list was filled by a line-up similar to last week, with the entries just bumped down a slot. The biggest drop-off was for Shaft which slide 39 percent from seventh to 10th place. The Paramount release took in $2.5 million and in five weeks of release has grossed $66 million.

In limited release, the oddball stalker movie Chuck & Buck played seven sites, earning $70,000. In just one venue The Wisdom of Crocodiles, Jude Law's turn as a vampire, had soft teeth, earning just $10,000

According to box-office tracker Exhibitor Relations, here are the estimated top 10 for this weekend (final figures are due Monday):

1. X-Men, $57.5 million
2. Scary Movie, $26.1 million
3. The Perfect Storm, $17.5 million
4. The Patriot, $11 million
5. Disney's The Kid, $10.5 million
6. Chicken Run, $7.8 million
7. Me, Myself & Irene, $5.7 million
8. Big Momma's House, $2.8 million
9. Gone in Sixty Seconds, $2.6 million
10. Shaft, $2.5 million