'Watchmen' Rules North American and Overseas Box Office

Movie

Though falling short of industry expectations, 'Watchmen' manages to refrain 'Madea Goes to Jail' from nabbing North American box office top slot for the third time, and wins the overseas sales.

March 10, 2009

AceShowbiz -

Off to a decent-but-not-spectacular start with an estimated $4.6 million, "Watchmen" followed it through by securing both the #1 slot at the North American as well as the overseas box office. The highly-anticipated live-action movie from director Zack Snyder opened solidly with $55.2 million from the U.S. and Canadian markets, and with $27.5 million from the overseas market.

While "Watchmen" sales was far behind Snyder's another impressive movie "300" on its first weekend, the Warner Bros. Pictures film has secured the 12th place for the highest-grossing opening weekend for a comic book movie, trailing behind "Fantastic Four", at the North American box office. Still, if ticket-price inflation is calculated, it will be in the 20th position.

In addition to that, it has become the sixth-highest grossing R-rated start, behind "The Matrix Reloaded", "The Passion of the Christ", "300", "Hannibal" and "Sex and the City", before the inflation adjustment. It also doubled the openings of "V for Vendetta" and "The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen", which are also adaptation from Alan Moore's graphic novels.

At the overseas box office, the movie starring Jackie Earle Haley and Jeffrey Dean Morgan has marked the biggest opening since "Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa" collected $31.1 million in early January. It debuted #1 in the U.K. with $4.6 million, Russia with $2.3 million, Australia with $2.3 million, Italy with $1.6 million and Korea with $1.4 million. It also topped the Brazil's, the Mexican's and the Netherlands' chart.

Editors' Pick

Falling to the second slot was "Madea Goes to Jail". Down 47.3|percent| over the weekend, this Tyler Perry's film earned $8.5 million to the total of $76.2 million. Hot on "Madea" heels was Liam Neeson-starring "Taken", which pulled in another $7.3 million on its sixth week. The action thriller, thus has collected $117.9 million in total.

Big winner at the 2009 Oscars, "Slumdog Millionaire", has slipped one slot to the fourth, experiencing a 25.6|percent| decline in sales. On its 17th weeks of screening, the rag-to-riches drama raked in $6.8 million to the total amount of $125.3 million. Rounding up the top five was "Paul Blart: Mall Cop" with $4.1 million.

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