Men In Black 3 could very well end up in the red unless the movie performs a whole lot better overseas than it did domestically over the weekend. According to studio estimates, the film earned an estimated $55 million over the three-day weekend. Not bad for your average movie, but the long-time-a-coming sequel was no average movie, having cost a reported $250 million to produce and another $100 million to market and promote. Moreover, it co-starred Will Smith, a star who ordinarily guarantees a big payoff at the box office. MIB3 did have the distinction of knocking The Avengers out of first place after the superhero flick had totally dominated everything in sight for the past three weeks. And indeed, The Avengers put up a valiant fight, winding up with $37 million in its fourth weekend, a result that pushed it past the $500-million mark domestically to $513.6 million. In third place, with $10.8 million was another disappointing blockbuster, Battleship . It, too, could have represented a major disaster for its studio, Universal, had it not been released overseas earlier this year when there was little competition. It has now earned more than $230 million abroad. Sacha Baron Cohen's The Dictator slipped to fourth place with $9.6 million, while Dark Shadows rounded out the top five with $8 million. The horror flick, The Chernobyl Diaries , the only other film to open wide this weekend, was reduced to toxic waste with $7.5 million.

28/05/2012