MUMBAI: The combination of the Olympics and the Colorado theatre massacre has had a sizeable impact on weekend box office sales that could end 30 per ccent down from last year.
Twentieth Century Fox‘s high-profile summer comedy The Watch starring Ben Stiller, Vince Vaughn, Jonah Hill and Richard Ayoade opened to a sluggish star with $4.5 million on Friday, well behind the $19 million earned by The Dark Knight Rises on its second Friday. The R-rated film earned a dismal C+ CinemaScore.
The weekend‘s other new entry is Summit Entertainment‘s 3D dance film Step Up Revolution that grossed $4.9 million to beat The Watch. Step Up 4 earned a B+ CinemaScore.
Most box office observers predict that The Watch will pull ahead of Step Up 4 and gross in the vicinity between $13 to $15 million range for the weekend, in comparison to $11 to $12 million for the Summit film.
Heading into the weekend, research firm NRG warned Hollywood studios that 20 to 25 per cent of the movie-going audience were hesitant to see a film this weekend because of the Colorado shooting and the Olympics.
Though by any measure, Dark Knight Rises continues to do good business, but there is no doubt that the film is leaving business on the table because of the shooting during a midnight screening of the film.
Comparing Friday over Friday collection, Dark Knight Rises fell 76 per cent, in line with other films that had sizeable midnight earnings on opening day.