ARTICLE
Weekend Box Office - America Spends Memorial Weekend With A Second Hangover
By InCinemas / 30 May 2011 (Monday)
There are two things American audiences tend to love more than anything else: raunch comedies and sequels. This weekend was the kind of line up that audiences drool over, featuring sequels in the top three spots and at number one the holy grail of mindless entertainment: the raunch comedy sequel
A clever marketing scheme and attractive trailers set up The Hangover for one of the top Rated-R comedy openings at $44 million. It went on to make a whopping $467 million world-wide. A sequel was inevitable.
Just as inevitable was its medicrioty, but that didn't stop audiences from kicking off their Memorial Day by handing over $86 million to The Hangover Part II in its first three days.
Another sequel, less mediocre and slightly less successful, also debuted. Kung Fu Panda 2 banked a respectable $53 million to take second place its first weekend out. It fell just short of the $60 million its predecessor enjoyed for its opening weekend, a sign that our heroic panda Po's Kung Fu might not be so strong this second time around.
Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides is finally seeing its tide start to go out. After a year-to-date high opening of $90 million last weekend it slipped to third place with a $39 million follow-up.
But the truly big winner this weekend was Hollywood's favorite loser: Woody Allen. His latest offering, Midnight In Paris, showed on just 58 screens but still managed to make nearly $2 million. That works out to $33,000 per theater. If that doesn't seem impressive, consider that The Hangover Part II had a per theater total of only $23,000.
For the four day Memorial Day weekend holiday check back tomorrow. For the three day totals, check out the chart below:
