Jonathan Wenk/Summit EntertainmentWarm Bodies was the liveliest thing in a dead weekend box office.
The new zombie-love comedy opened big with $20 million, per Friday-Sunday studio estimates, scoring with women and drawing about evenly from teens and the over-21 crowd.
Overall, ticket sales for the top movies were down by more than 20 percent from the same Super Bowl weekend last year, when the box office boasted two $20 million-plus performers.
This time out, Warm Bodies was the only film to make even $10 million.
Bullet to the Head, the Sylvester Stallone cop-action film, was a dud in its debut, grossing $4.5 million and settling for sixth place in the standings.
Stand Up Guys, another new crime film, with Al Pacino, Christopher Walken and Alan Arkin, grossed only $1.5 million from some 660 theaters, and failed to crack the Top 10.
The unusually strong crop of Best Picture nominees tried to do its part. Fully half of of the Top 10 was comprised of contenders, including Steven Spielberg's Lincoln, which climbed back into the rankings in its 13th week in release. Ben Affleck's Argo was right on Lincoln's heels, jumping up to 11th place (in its 17th week in theaters), and topping $120 million overall domestically.
All things considered, Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters, last weekend's No. 1 movie, held OK. Its two-week domestic total stands at $34.5 million.
Movie 43, the misfire of last weekend, saw its meager ticket sales plunge by two-thirds as it made a quick exit from the Top 10.
Here's a complete look at the weekend's top movies, per Friday-Sunday studio estimates and stats as compiled per Exhibitor Relations:
- Warm Bodies, $20 million
- Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters, $9.2 million
- Silver Linings Playbook, $8.1 million
- Mama, $6.7 million
- Zero Dark Thirty, $5.3 million
- Bullet to the Head, $4.5 million
- Parker, $3.2 million
- Django Unchained, $3 million
- Les Misérables, $2.44 million
- Lincoln, $2.4 million