Don’t let the headline fool you: In an ugly, ugly weekend at the box office, New Year’s Eve didn’t so much win the week as it was just less revolting (monetarily speaking) than the rest.
The star-studded rom-com took the box office crown with all the excitement and verve of a gray Tuesday in February, collecting an estimated $13.7 million. While that’s more than I’ll make in 547 years, it’s not particularly good for a major motion picture. For comparison’s sake, director Garry Marshall’s other sparkly rom-com, Valentine’s Day, earned $56.2 million its opening weekend—more than four times the take of New Year’s Eve. You gotta wonder whether the clock has truly struck midnight with this holiday-themed franchise.
Still, the bubbly romance still managed to out-earn The Sitter, the weekend’s other major player. The Jonah Hill comedy thought infusing a PG-13-rated trope (unlikely caretaker bonds with precocious youngsters, a la Daddy Day Care or Big Daddy) with some hard R-rated content would lead to a big payday. No such luck. Audiences aren’t interested in watching Hill watch anybody—much less watch him expose little tots to drug dens staffed by bodybuilders in Speedos.
The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn – Part 1 made $7.9 million on its slide down to third place. Those sparkly vampires again staved off a challenge from The Muppets, which earned $7.1 million. Muppet-loving critics—which, judging by its 97% “fresh” rating on rottentomatoes.com, would be nearly all of them—are now contemplating why The Muppets hasn’t been the runaway blockbuster that some expected it to be. Time’s Richard Corliss says that, “Some insiders suspect that the humor in The Muppets … might be too hip for the yokels.”
I never thought I’d see the day where the weekend’s most ostensibly sophisticated movie would also star a boatload of puppets.
Arthur Christmas rounded out the weekend’s Top 5, dropping less than 11% of its audience. With Christmas just around the corner, I wonder whether Arthur might actually see a bump upward next week.
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