Clay Enos. TM & © DC ComicsYou might not notice the resemblance at first, but Watchmen looks a lot like BASEketball. When it crashes.
The superhumanly hyped comic-book movie saw ticket sales plunge 67 percent from last weekend's debately big opening. It landed in second, with an estimated $18.1 million Friday-Sunday gross, and got beat but good by the Duane Johnson-fueled Race to Witch Mountain, which led the box office with $25 million.
The latest horror movie remake, The Last House on the Left, bowed in third place, with $14.7 million.
Chuck Viane, distribution president for Witch Mountain's Disney, summed up the weekend race like so: "I think everybody thought it would have been a lot closer."
Warner Bros., the studio behind Watchmen, meanwhile, insisted it was prepared for its film's drop in cabin pressure.
"This is falling within the norms of highly anticipated movies," exec Jeff Goldstein said, citing other movies with significant second-weekend drops: Sex and the City, Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer and X-Men: The Last Stand. All three actually fell slightly less than Watchmen. (The drop-off recorded by Trey Parker and Matt Stone's BASEketball, however, very nearly matches the superhero film, percentage point for percentage point.)
Overall, after two weekends, Watchmen has grossed $86 million domestically. The movie cost a reported $120-$150 million to produce.
Here's a complete look at the weekend's top-grossing films based on Friday-Sunday estimates from Exhibitor Relations:
- Race to Witch Mountain, $25 million
- Watchmen, $18.1 million
- The Last House on the Left, $14.7 million
- Taken, $6.7 million
- Tyler Perry's Madea Goes to Jail, $5.1 million
- Slumdog Millionaire, $5 million
- Paul Blart: Mall Cop, $3.1 million
- He's Just Not That Into You, $2.9 million
- Coraline, $2.7 million
- Miss March, $2.4 million