DISNEY - ACTIVITY ANYTHING BUT NORMAL FOR PARANORMAL ACTIVITY

ACTIVITY ANYTHING BUT NORMAL FOR PARANORMAL ACTIVITY

In a rare case of a studio underestimating a film's weekend ticket sales by 12 percent, Paramount said Monday that Paranormal Activity , which it had figured would earn $7.07 million over the weekend actually wound up with $7.9 million. Since weekend estimates are based on actual receipts for Friday and Saturday and an "educated guess" for Sunday, the fact that the movie earned more than $800,000 above what had been expected on Sunday seemed as extraordinary as the original total for a movie playing on just 160 screens. In fact, the $49,379 per-theater average was the highest ever recorded for a movie playing in more than 100 theaters. Conspicuously, actual ticket sales for the weekend's top movie, Universal's Couples Retreat , came in at $34.3 million -- or $1 million below the studio's estimate.

The top ten films over the weekend, according to final figures compiled by Box Office Mojo (figures in parentheses represent total gross to date) 1. Couples Retreat , Universal, $34,286,740, (New); 2. Zombieland, Sony, $14,802,431, 2 Wks. ($47,603,512); 3. Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs , Sony, $11,527,480, 4 Wks. ($95,778,436); 4. Paranormal Activity, Paramount, $7,900,695, 3 Wks. ($9,113,936); 5. Toy Story/Toy Story 2, Disney, $7,766,643, 2 Wks. ($22,768,991); 6. Surrogates , Disney, $4,268,314, 3 Wks. ($32,725,781); 7. The Invention of Lying, Warner Bros., $3,339,263, 2 Wks. ($12,295,868); 8. Whip It, Fox Searchlight, $2,827,512, 2 Wks. ($8,793,570); 9. Capitalism A Love Story, Overture, $2,630,292, 3 Wks. ($9,025,483); 10. Fame, MGM, $2,543,067, 3 Wks. ($20,028,829).

13/10/2009