Box Office Update: Branded on Both Ends

We're getting very close to actually being ahead of where we were in 2010, and I can't quite pick up why we have been failing so much this year. Audiences still aren't being intelligent with their choices, but they just aren't going to the theater as much as they used to. I admit that I visited the theater more often last year than I have this year, but I'd never wait for a film I'm truly excited to see to release on DVD. The theatrical experience is one of the things that makes this medium of art and entertainment so powerful. I do hope that this year's box office slump has more to do with the quality of the films playing, and less to do with people having grown tired of the big screen experience.

We can still expect films like Hop to succeed more than anything else, an immediate and sustainable draw for the child crowd. The Easter themed flick held onto the top spot, dropping 42.2% from its debut. Another strange draw for the kiddie crowd, Arthur, took second place with the highest of four relatively low openings. Hanna, the true spectacle of this weekend, was right behind it with a higher average per theater. Soul Surfer, which played surprisingly well with audiences this weekend, followed Hanna with an even higher average. Last weekend's horror film, Insidious, held on most impressively amongst last weekend's films, dropping only 26.6%. Your Highness skidded just below the $10 million mark, marking the lowest income of the new releases. Source Code dropped by a margin less than Hop, but greater than Insidious, falling 38.9%. Overall, this weekend was a 13.9% drop from 2010, when Date Night opened shortly behind the second weekend of Clash of the Titans.

1. Hop (Second Weekend; $21.7 million)
2. Arthur (First Weekend; $12.6 million)
3. Hanna (First Weekend; $12.3 million)
4. Soul Surfer (First Weekend; $11.1 million)
5. Insidious (Second Weekend; $9.7 million)
6. Your Highness (First Weekend; $9.5 million)
7. Source Code (Second Weekend; $9 million)
8. Limitless (Fourth Weekend; $5.7 million)
9. Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick Rules (Third Weekend; $4.9 million)
10. The Lincoln Lawyer (Fourth Weekend; $4.6 million)