Believe it or not, the biggest opening weekend for a baseball movie before now was $19.7M, owned by the dreadful Rob Schneider/Jon Heder comedy, The Benchwarmers. That blight on the sports movie record has finally been corrected as 42 knocked a home run to the tune of $27.3M. Capitalizing on the beginning of the MLB season and the strength of Jackie Robinson's incredible story, this would seem to make an instant name out of star, Chadwick Boseman, who is rightfully earning acclaim for his performance. Baseball films are always a tricky business, as evidenced by the split response to Moneyball and Trouble with the Curve, but 42 seems to have the right niche of appealing to fans of the sport and those looking for an inspirational true story.
2. Scary Movie 5- $15.1M
Waiting six years between films and losing star Anna Faris seems to have done a number on the Scary Movie franchise, with the fifth chapter opening to a weak $15.1M. That's lower than the debut of A Haunted House, from Scary Movie co-creator Marlon Wayans, who must be laughing his butt off right now. Sure, he said that there isn't a competition between the two, but does anybody really believe that?
3. The Croods- $13.2M/$143M
A lack of animated family film offerings has helped catapult The Croods, which is now right behind Oz the Great and Powerful as the year's top-grossers. The total is more than enough for Dreamworks to start thinking about sequels, prequels (can you go further back then prehistoric?), spinoffs, and whatever else.
4. G.I. Joe: Retaliation- $10.8M/$102M
5. Evil Dead- $9.5M/$41M
As expected, Evil Dead took quite a tumble in its second weekend, true to form for the horror genre. But by now it's more than doubled the production budget, and should soak up a sizable profit once all is said and done. Is it enough to justify the proposed expansion of future sequels and an Army of Darkness follow-up?
6. Jurassic Park 3D- $8M/$31M
7. Olympus Has Fallen- $6.8M/$81M
8. Oz the Great and Powerful- $4.8M/$219M
9. Tyler Perry's Temptation- $4.3M/$45M
10. The Place Beyond the Pines- $3.8M/$5.1M
