Cars 2 Bridge Still 2011
Disney/PixarLumbering Po proved no match for those speedy Cars guys.
Pixar/Disney’s Cars 2 in 3D posted a swift No. 1 opening lap on the foreign theatrical circuit, beating comparable overseas debuts of previous Pixar outings.Director-coscripter John Lasseter’s animation adventure comedy drew $42.9 million ov
erall — for a per-location average of $13,710 –from 3,129 venues in 18 overseas territories, which represent what Disney described as “25% of our potential performance.”
The opening take was 127% ahead of the comparable figure registered by the 2006 Cars original, which grossed $217.9 million offshore. In addition, said Disney, the Cars 2 debut beat that of 2009’s Up (which grossed a total of $438.3 million foreign) by 80%. The weekend also outpaced that of 2007’s Ratatouille (with a foreign cume of $417.3 million) by 77%; and that of 2010’s Toy Story 3 ($648.2) by 4%.
Biggest Cars 2 markets were Russia ($9.3 million), Mexico ($8.1 million), Brazil ($7.6 million), Italy ($5.7 million) and Australia ($5.2 million). Disney said that the opening three-day gross total worldwide came to $110.9 million.
Meanwhile, DreamWorks Animation’s Kung Fu Panda 2 – playing more than three times as many offshore territories on the weekend as Cars 2 — dropped to No. 2 this time after a $32.9 million weekend overall at 10,467 locations in 46 markets. Panda 2 had been the No. 1 foreign box office champ for the previous two stanzas.
Cume for the 3D animation title (released by Paramount) comes to $336 million since its overseas debut on May 26. Its No. 2 (after Cars 2) Australia premier drew $4.87 million from 448 spots.
No. 3 on the weekend, Warner Bros.’The Hangover Part 2, registered a first-place Spain opening ($2.87 million including previews from 330 screens) and grossed $16.5 million on the weekend overall from 5,574 screens in 56 markets. Cume for the biggest-grossing R-rated comedy of all time comes to $284 million offshore with a Japan opening on tap this week.
No. 4 was Disney’s Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides, which drew $13.5 million on the weekend, pushing the overseas gross total for the Jerry Bruckheimer production costarring Johnny Depp to $756.1 million — three-and-a-third times the adventure fantasy’s domestic gross. Worldwide tally ($985.2 million) is breathing hard on the $1-billion benchmark.
A pair of female-oriented comedies opened strongly in key markets.
Sony’s Bad Teacher, starring Cameron Diaz as a foul-mouthed junior high school teacher, drew A-plus premiers in Germany ($5.7 million from 449 screens), Austria, Belgium and Holland, finishing No. 1 in each market.
Overall, the R-rated comedy grossed $12.37 million from 1,530 screens in 24 markets for an early foreign gross total of $17.76 million. A No. 4 second weekend in the U.K. dropped 40% to $1.7 million elicited from 427 screens for a market cume of $7.1 million.
Bridesmaids’ No. 1 debut in the U.K. and Ireland elicited $5.5 million from 482 locations while a No. 3 Russia bow at 331 playdates registered $1.3 million. Overall on the weekend, the Kirsten Wiig vehicle grossed $11.3 million from a total of 1,205 screens in 11 territories, pushing its early overseas total to $21.1 million.
20th Century Fox’s X-Men: First Class pushed its worldwide cume past the $300-million mark
(cume, $317 million) thanks to a $13.2 million weekend overseas at 6,914 sites in 68 markets, sufficient to claim the weekend’s No. 5 spot. International gross total stands at $187.3 million.
Super 8, Paramount’s sci-fi adventure written and directed by J.J. Abrams and produc
ed by Steven Spielberg, is performing much stronger in the U.S. and Canada (cume $95.2 million) than overseas. Japan is Spielberg territory, and Super 8 premiered No. 2 there at 520 locations for an $4.8 million opening round. Overall weekend on the foreign circuit drew $9.9 million from 2,373 locations in 26 territories, nudging the offshore cume to $35.6 million.Flaccid so far overseas are Warner Bros.’ The Green Lantern and Fox’s Mr. Popper’s Penguin
s. The screen edition of the DC comics superhero generated $7 million on the weekend at some 3,000 screens in 16 markets, bringing its overseas gross total over two rounds to 29.3 million. Jim Carrey’s latest comedy, rolling out slowly offshore, grossed $3.15 million from 1,173 screens in 16 markets, nudging its overseas gross total to $4.4 million over two rounds.
New local language releases took the numbers two and three spots in France. Finishing second in the market was UGC Distribution’s L’eleve Ducobu (The Student Ducobu), director-coscripter Philippe de Chauveron’s comedy about a likeable school dunce (Claude Vincent). Opening round at 471screens drew $2.5 million.
No. 3 was director Roschdy Zem’s crime drama, Omar m’a tuer (Omar Killed Me), about the questionable conviction of a gardener accused of murder. The Mars Distribution release grossed an estimated $1.6 million from 247 sites.
Other international cumes: Mars Distribution’s Midnight in Paris, $14.5 million over seven rounds in France only; Fox’s 127 Hours, $26.9 million; Universal’s Fast Five, $388.9 million; Europa’s Tree of Life, $8.9 million over seven frames in France only; Universal’s Honey 2, $2.5 million; Focus Features’ Biutiful, $19.5 million; Memento Films’ Nader and Simin, A Separation, $3.3 million over three rounds in France only; Focus Features’ Another Year, $15.3 million; Fox’s Black Swan, $220.3 million; Universal’s The Adjustment Bureau, $63 million; Fox’s Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick Rules, $17.5 million; Universal’s The Debt, $1.1 million; Lionsgate’s Limitless, $72.5 million; Focus Features’ Beginners, $1.54 million; Universal’s Hop, $69.2 million; and Fox’s Big Mommas: Like Father, Like Son, $46.3 million.
Opening in some 60 foreign territories this week – and likely to dominate offshore box office — is director Michael Bay’s latest Transformers installment from Paramount, Transformers: Dark of the Moon.
