RIDE ALONG SETS NEW BOX OFFICE RECORD FOR JANUARY

Box-office pundits were wrong again. For the second weekend in a row their predictions about how the current releases would fare badly misfired. Last weekend they figured that Lone Survivor would earn around $20-25 million; it wound up with $37.8 million. On Friday they predicted that the Kevin Hart/Ice Cube comedy Ride Along would also open with around $20-25 million; instead it set a new January record with $40 million, according to studio estimates. Lone Survivor, meanwhile, slipped to second place with around $23.5 million. The animated The Nut Job opened in third place with $20.6 million. Most analysts had predicted that it would earn about half that amount. They did say that the new Jack Ryan thriller, Shadow Recruit, would have a hard time cracking $20 million this weekend — and they were right on that account; it came in at around $17.2 million. Continuing to impress, Disney’s Frozen slipped just 19 percent from last weekend, pulling in $12 million in is eighth weekend. BoxOfficeMojo.com reported that that amount amounts to the fourth-highest eighth weekend ever. Coming in seventh was the latest found-footage horror flick, Devil’s Due. Although most analysts figured it would earn in the neighborhood of $10-15 million, it actually managed to take in just $8.5 million.

The top ten films for the weekend, according to studio estimates compiled by Rentrak:
1. Ride Along, $41.2 million; 2. Lone Survivor, $23.2 million; 3. The Nut Job, $20.6 million; 4. Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit, $17.2 million; 5. Frozen, $12 million; 6. American Hustle, $10.6 million ; 7. Devil’s Due, $8.5 million; 8. August: Osage County, $7.6 million; 9. The Wolf of Wall Street, $7.5 million; 10. Saving Mr. Banks, $4.1 million.