You 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 debatedly big opening. It landed in second, with an estimated $18.1 million Friday-Sunday gross, and got plain beat by the Dwayne Johnson-fueled Race to Witch Mountain, which led the box office with $25 million.
The latest horror remake, The Last House on the Left, bowed at 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 the drop in cabin pressure.
"This is falling within the norms of highly anticipated movies," exec Jeff Goldstein said, citing Sex and the City, Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer and X-Men: The Last Stand as films that also suffered significant second-weekend drops. All three fell about the same as, though slightly less, than Watchmen.
The superhero film's fall more closely matches, percentage point for percentage point, the drop-off recorded by Trey Parker and Matt Stone's 1998 un-hit comedy, BASEketball. Which probably isn't what Dr. Manhattan was going for.
Drilling down into the numbers:
• Last weekend, Watchmen looked like The Incredible Hulk. This weekend, not so much. The 2008 Hulk reboot held better, relatively speaking (falling about 60 percent from its debut), and made more money ($22.1 million).
• If Watchmen cost $120 million to produce, as some reports suggested, it should cover its budget with its domestic gross. If it cost $150 million to produce, as other reports suggested, it probably won't. After two weekends, Watchmen has grossed $86 million overall in North America.
• Witch Mountain made back half of its reputed $50 million budget in three days.
• The Rock—sorry—Mr. Johnson is an equal opportunity draw. Fifty-one percent of Witch Mountain's audience was female; 49 percent, male; 56 percent of the crowd was under 25; 44 percent, over 25.
• It was unknown how much Witch Mountain's source material, Escape to Witch Mountain, grossed in 1975. But Johnson might have a ways to go to top the original. According to The-Numbers.com, The Apple Dumpling Gang, another 1975 Disney release, grossed $31.9 million. Or roughly the equivalent of $112 million today.
• When medals are handed out for the recession-defying 2009 box office, Taken ($6.7 million; $126.8 million overall) and Paul Blart: Mall Cop ($3.1 million; $137.8 million) deserve spots at the front of the line, with the nearly as sturdy He's Just Not That Into You ($2.9 million; $89 million) and Coraline ($2.7 million; $69.1 million overall) not far behind.
• Confessions of a Shopaholic ($2 million; $41.4 million overall) and especially Fired Up! ($1.7 million; $15.4 million overall), both bounced from the Top 10, probably won't be getting ribbons.
• Amy Adams followed up on her Oscar nomination with a monster opening on the art-house circuit for the comedy Sunshine Cleaning. Playing at four theaters, the comedy grossed $214,000 for a weekend- and year-best per-screen average of $53,500.
• In its third weekend, The Jonas Brothers: The 3D Concert Experience averaged $936 at each of its remaining 958 screens.
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
(Originally published Mar. 15, 2008, at 9:19 a.m. PT)