FOOTLOOSE TRIPPED BY REAL STEEL

Paramount’s Footloose, which held a slim lead at the box office on Friday and Saturday, lost its footing on Sunday and wound up in second place for the weekend as Disney/DreamWorks’s Real Steel made a comeback, thanks to Sunday’s influx of family audiences at many theaters. Neither film had much to boast about, however. Real Steel‘s domestic total in its second week came to just $16.29 million, a paltry amount given the film’s reported $125-million budget. Footloose opened with just $15.57 million, but it reportedly cost less than $25 million to make. Two other newcomers had disappointing results. Universal’s The Thing placed third with just $8.49 million while 20th Century Fox’s The Big Year became one of the biggest flops of the year with $3.3 million. Altogether the weekend’s crop of films grossed $77.03 million, representing a 36-percent drop from a year ago when Jackass 3D opened with $50.36 million and the total take came to $119.52 million.

The top ten films over the weekend, according to final figures compiled by Box Office Mojo (figures in parentheses represent total gross to date):
1. Real Steel, Disney, $16,291,655, 2 Wks. ($51,731,456); 2. Footloose, Paramount, $15,556,113, (New); 3. The Thing, Universal, $8,493,665, (New); 4. The Ides of March, Sony, $7,108,846, 2 Wks. ($21,763,235); 5. Dolphin Tale, Warner Bros., $6,233,185, 4 Wks. ($58,560,166); 6. Moneyball, Sony, $5,456,730, 4 Wks. ($57,668,988); 7. 50/50, Summit, $4,260,087, 2 Wks. ($24,279,152); 8. Courageous, Sony/Tristar, $3,305,238, 3 Wks. ($21,282,828); 9. The Big Year, 20th Century Fox, $3,251,884, (New); 10. The Lion King, Disney, $2,792,403, 5 Wks. ($90,536,318).