BOX OFFICE REPORT: HOTEL TRANSYLVANIA and LOOPER Bring Success for Sony
Sony Pictures set this weekend up to be a huge one, releasing not only a film for the kiddies (Adam Sandler’s animated comedy HOTEL TRANSYLVANIA), but a film for all the adults as well (the Joesph Gordon Levitt and Bruce Willis time travel flick LOOPER). And if Sony was hoping for success, they got it…
On one end of the spectrum, HOTEL TRANSYLVANIA broke Sony’s September box office record held previously by SMURFS (I KNOW RIGHT!!) with $43 million domestically over the weekend. TRANSYLVANIA stars Adam Sandler, Andy Samberg, Kevin James, Selena Gomez and Steve Buscemi, and takes place at a high end resort for monsters run by Dracula (Sandler) who runs into a problem when a boy (Samberg) finds the hotel and falls for his teenage daughter (Gomez).
LOOPER came in second, bringing in $21.2 million on a budget of just over $30 million (it should easily make up the difference in the coming week). Directed by Gordon-Levitt’s BRICK director, Rian Johnson, LOOPER takes place in the future when time travel is now a real part of life but has been made illegal. The mob hires men known as Loopers to send people they want killed back 30 years into the past to get killed there. Gordon-Levitt leads the cast with Emily Blunt, Bruce Willis, Paul Dano, and Jeff Daniels.
Both films combined to help make Sony Pictures the top earning studio of the year thus far. (With $1.285 Billion this year, they have just passed Warner Brothers.) Whether or not they end the year on top is different, but for now it’s time for the studio to celebrate.
As for the rest of the top five, END OF WATCH takes 3rd place with $8 million in it’s second week, TROUBLE WITH THE CURVE finishes right behind with $7.5 million. HOUSE AT THE END OF THE STREET took 5th place with $7.1 million and the big shocker of the week was PITCH PERFECT, the Anna Kendrick starring musical comedy about an all girls singing group that get’s some much needed energy from a new member. PITCH PERFECT only hit 335 theaters last week and still managed to make over $5 million dollars.