Even with a full day of football and inaugural festivities, Americans found time to hit the nation’s movie theaters this Martin Luther King Day weekend, according to data provided by Paul Dergarabedian, box office analyst for Hollywood.com.
It, however, was an especially good weekend for acclaimed actress Jessica Chastain, whose films held the top two spots on this week’s box office chart.
Mama, the PG-13 rated horror film from Universal, opened with a better-than-expected four-day weekend gross of $33 million. Say PG-13 rated horror flick and the teens flock and that’s likely what happened with the Chastain starrer.
Zero Dark Thirty, the movie that recently garnered her an Academy Award nomination for best actress, came in at No. 2 with $18.7 million in the same span.
The big winner this weekend is Silver Linings Playbook, which generated $13 million after receiving eight Oscar nominations. Wasting little time, the powers that be at The Weinstein Co. raised its number of theaters, by more than 1,700 to capitalize on that momentum. The film received nominations in several major categories including best actor, best actress and best picture.
Rounding out the top five movies for the week is the disappointing Gangster Squad with $10.3 million and the Marlon Wayans horror parody A Haunted House with $9.7 million.
The biggest surprise of the weekend may have been the lackluster performance of Mark Wahlberg’s Broken City which grabbed just $9.5 million.
Here are this week’s Top 10 films according to Hollywood.com’s Dergarabedian:
Mama (Universal): $33 million
Zero Dark Thirty (Columbia): $18.7 million
Silver Linings Playbook (The Weinstein Co.): $13 million
Gangster Squad (Warner Bros.): $10.3 million
A Haunted House (Open Road Films): $9.7 million
Broken City (Fox): $9.5 million
Les Miserables (Universal): $9.2 million
Django Unchained (The Weinstein Co.): $9.2 million
The Hobbit (Warner Bros.): $7.7 million
The Last Stand (Lionsgate): $6.1 million
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