Before the weekend's box office report was even released, we already foresee this will be coming. Transformers: Dark of the Moon once again held on to first place in its second weekend, before surrendering the throne to the wizard boys finale next weekend. The threequel of Michael Bay-directed robotic saga defied two newcomers New Line Cinema's Horrible Bosses and Sony's Zookeeper. Read on for more after the jump.
Transformers: Dark of the Moon raked in another $47.1 million on the second weekend, a drop of 52% from last week opening gross. with $261.1 million on its pocket with some more to come, Transformers: Dark of the Moon is the year's top earner by passing The Hangover Part II. It also raked in a further $93 million from the oversea markets. After two weeks, the alien robots has a massive worldwide total of $645 million. Breaking into the billion dollar zone may be a little struggle but conceived possible at the moment with top markets like China and Japan are still to come.
When it was clear that Transformers will win the weekend, two newcomers fought for the runner-up spot. The new dark comedy by New Line Cinemas and Warner Bros, Horrible Bosses opened to $28.3 million for a key result deemed enough to edge out the Sony's Zookeeper. The gross was a victory itself by proving that audiences were yet again handing another winning streak for R-rated comedies this summer. With Bridesmaids, The Hangover Part II and Bad Teacher which opened earlier; these R-rated comedies have generated about $480 million and more will come. Later this summer, other titles like Friends with Benefits and The Change-Up will be making another shot for victory, although the former seems might be heading for a thud. Horrible Bosses also became the top-grossing opening ever for a dark/black comedy, beating out The Stepford Wives remake. Horrible Bosses' audience skewed slightly male (51 percent), while 64 percent were over the age of 25 years old, according to Warner Bros.
Sony's Zookeeper launched to $20.1 million, a number significantly at the lower-end for family film. It was also unable to shake-off much of the 'jinx of the talking animals' although still able to open higher than last summer's Marmaduke and Cats & Dogs: The Revenge of the Kitty Galore. While this kind of film may tend to have lagging business over the weeks to come, do not expect a significant long-lasting business like Yogi Bear did during the Holiday season. Zookeeper managed to out-do the opening gross a bit higher than Jim Carrey's Mr Popper's Penguins but that was not enough to mark anything impressive about it. Distributor Sony Pictures' research showed that 52 percent of Zookeeper's audience was parents and their children, and that 53 percent was female.
The rest of the week's box office looks like this and is based on studio's actual data:
| Rank | Title | Weekend Gross ($) | Change (%) | Total Gross ($) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | TRANSFORMERS: DARK OF THE MOON | 47,103,276 | -51.9 | 261,078,700 |
| 2 | HORRIBLE BOSSES | 28,302,165 | NEW | 28,302,165 |
| 3 | ZOOKEEPER | 20,065,617 | NEW | 20,065,617 |
| 4 | CARS 2 | 15,212,015 | -42.1 | 148,831,530 |
| 5 | BAD TEACHER | 8,914,412 | -38.5 | 78,671,819 |
| 6 | LARRY CROWNE | 5,936,405 | -54.7 | 26,197,690 |
| 7 | SUPER 8 | 4,838,205 | -38.9 | 118,069,546 |
| 8 | MONTE CARLO | 3,800,604 | -49.0 | 16,125,507 |
| 9 | MR. POPPER'S PENGUINS | 3,154,435 | -43.0 | 58,051,209 |
| 10 | GREEN LANTERN | 3,147,225 | -52.0 | 109,731,181 |
| 11 | MIDNIGHT IN PARIS | 2,634,785 | -26.4 | 38,579,052 |
| 12 | BRIDESMAIDS | 2,628,285 | -27.9 | 158,142,030 |