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Paramount Pictures
It's all about Iron Man today. Just over $104 million, from late Thursday previews through Sunday night? Astonishing. Last week numbers in the $70 to $80 million range were floated as possible, if optimistic. The Los Angeles Times deemed predictions of a hundred-million opening weekend for the movie "giddy." Well, giddy up. And it couldn't have happened to a better movie -- this may well be the perfect comic book movie. Or to a more deserving star ... who doesn't want to cheer on the comeback of the ultra-talented Robert Downey Jr.? (As Entertainment Weekly notes, he's never starred in a movie that's made more than $100 million in its entire run, never mind one that enjoyed that kind of opening weekend.) EW also points out that 64 percent of ticket buyers were men over the age of 25 (though Box Office Mojo says the percentage is more like 55), which says that it's not just geeks on the whole but geeks of a certain age -- Generation Xers -- who are responsible for the success of this one. Which is a particularly interesting shift in demographics that may be an aberration or may be a hint of things to come, like a more general taking seriously of things that used to be considered exclusively kids' stuff. There were other movies playing this weekend, but do we really care? The dumb and drippy Made of Honor, also debuting, took the No. 2 slot, far behind with a payday of $15.5 million, with the even dumber and drippier Baby Mama, over its second weekend, earning $13.3 million. The forgettable Forgetting Sarah Marshall and the "even the title is offensive" Harold and Kumar Escape From Guantanamo Bay were a distant 4 and 5, each with a sliver over $6 million for the weekend. It was so all about Iron Man that even the indies, which typically enjoy far higher per-screen averages than multiplex fare, couldn't keep up. The metal dude took in $24,543 at each of his 4,105 venues, but the next best per-screen was for the new IFC release Mister Lonely, which earned $19,100 on its single screen. On any other weekend, that might have seemed a lot less lonely. -=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Comments
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