Box Office Results: No Good Deed Does a Pretty Good Deed for Weak Box Office

The ComingSoon.net Box Office Report has been updated with studio estimates for the weekend. Click here for the full box office estimates of the top 12 films and then check back on Tuesday for the final figures based on actual box office.

After a number of down weekends, things picked up at the box office with two new movies, but what should have been a sure-thing sequel was overshadowed by the home invasion thriller, No Good Deed (Sony/Screen Gems), starring Idris Elba and Taraji P. Henson, which took the top spot with an estimated $24.5 million in just 2,175 theaters, averaging over $11,000 per site.

Produced for a modest $13.2 million, it’s another instantly profitable hit for producer Will Packer, who began the year with the hit buddy comedy Ride Along and the remake of About Last Night, both starring Kevin Hart. (While the summer sequel, Think Like a Man Too, also starring Hart, grossed less than its predecessor, its $65 million domestic take still made it profitable.)

The trend of family sequels not doing as well as their original installments continued as Dolphin Tale 2 (Warner Bros.), starring Harry Connick Jr., Morgan Freeman and Ashley Judd, opened weaker than its predecessor with just $16.6 million in 3,656 theaters (almost 1,500 more than No Good Deed). Averaging just $4,500 per site, it fell short of the $19.1 million opening of the original movie in September 2011 in slightly fewer theaters.

After four non-consecutive weekends at #1 (and two weekends in second place), Marvel and Walt Disney Studios’ Guardians of the Galaxy dropped to third place but crossed the $300 million mark domestically, the first movie of 2014 to do so. It took in $8 million over the weekend in 3,104 theaters, down just 22% from the previous weekend for a domestic total of $306 million.

“Guardians” opened in Japan this weekend to score $2.1 million in its first two days, which is more than the Japan openings of Captain America: The Winter Soldier and Thor: The Dark World. That contributed to the blockbuster’s $9.3 million grossed overseas this weekend which took its international gross to a similar amount of $305.6 million. The movie is still to open in China and Italy, but so far it’s one of the few summer blockbusters that has done equally well domestically and overseas.

20th Century Fox’s adaptation of James Dashner’s The Maze Runner, which opens domestically on Thursday, September 18, opened early in five overseas markets over the weekend where it grossed a strong $8.3 million in Mexico, Taiwan, Malaysia, Singapore and Central America.

Taking fourth place, Paramount’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, starring Megan Fox, added another $4.8 million to its domestic take of $181 million.

One of the sleeper hits of the late summer, the faux cop comedy Let’s Be Cops (20th Century Fox), starring Damon Wayans Jr. and Jake Johnson, continues to do well into September, dropping just 23% to take fifth place with $4.3 million. So far, it’s grossed $73 million, a substantial profit for a $17 million comedy.

Opening more moderately than the other new movies in just 809 theaters, the crime drama The Drop, based on Dennis Lehane’s short story and starring Tom Hardy, Noomi Rapace and the late James Gandolfini, took in an estimated $4.2 million for fourth place, averaging $5,500 per location.

It was the first of six consecutive book adaptations that filled the remainder of the Top 11 with If I Stay (Warner Bros.), starring Chloe Grace Moretz, taking seventh place with $4.1 million and nearly $45 million grossed domestically since opening in August.

Pierce Brosnan’s return to the spy action-thriller The November Man (Relativity Media) also dropped three places to eighth with $2.8 million and $22.5 million total.

The Top 10 was rounded out by two more book adaptations, The Giver (The Weinstein Company) and The Hundred-Foot Journey (DreamWorks), with $2.6 and $2.5 million. Both have surpassed their respective production budgets with the former having grossed $41.4 million and the latter reaching $49.4 million.

Despite sporting the first new movies to break into the Top 2 in almost a month, the box office was still down about $12 million from the same weekend last year when the horror sequel Insidious Chapter 2 (FilmDistrict) topped the box office with over $40 million, while second place went to the Luc Besson action-comedy The Family (Relativity).

Of the limited releases, the Bill Hader-Kristen Wiig dramedy The Skeleton Twins (Roadside Attractions) fared the best, opening in 15 theaters in select cities on Friday where it grossed $411 thousand or $27.4 thousand per location. Plans are to expand the movie into Top 10 markets next Friday and then nationwide on September 26.

Opening in 11 theaters, the Kevin Kline-Maggie Smith comedy My Old Lady (Cohen Media Group) took in $134 thousand or $12.2 thousand per site.

Ned Benson’s drama The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby: Them (The Weinstein Company), starring Jessica Chastain and James McAvoy, wound up with $77.2 thousand from its four theaters in New York and Los Angeles or $19.3 thousand per location.

Click here for the full box office estimates of the top 12 films.