North American box-office actuals have been released for the Sept. 2-5, 2011, Labor Day weekend. Tate Taylor’s The Help easily topped the slow holiday weekend, grossing $19.88 million according to Box Office Mojo. That’s nearly $1 million more than the studio’s original $19m estimate. As mentioned in a previous box-office post, The Help is the first movie since Christopher Nolan-Leonardo DiCaprio’s summer 2010 sci-fier Inception to top the North American box-office chart for three consecutive weekends.
The Help, by now an all-but-assured Best Picture Oscar and SAG Award for Best Cast contender, features Emma Stone, Viola Davis, Octavia Spencer, Jessica Chastain, Bryce Dallas Howard, Sissy Spacek, Mary Steenburgen, Allison Janney, Cicely Tyson, Chris Lowell, and Mike Vogel. Director Taylor adapted Kathryn Stockett’s bestselling novel.
Directed by Shakespeare in Love’s John Madden, produced and co-written by Kick-Ass‘ Matthew Vaughn, and starring Avatar’s Sam Worthington, Academy Award winner Helen Mirren, The Help and The Tree of Life’s Jessica Chastain, two-time Academy Award nominee Tom Wilkinson, Ciarán Hinds, Marton Csokas, and Jesper Christensen, the Focus Features/Miramax adult-oriented espionage thriller The Debt earned a modest $12.85m at 1,826 theaters, averaging $7,038 per location.
At no. 3, newcomer Apollo 18 pulled in a mediocre $10.7m at 3,328 locations. Produced by Wanted and Night Watch filmmaker Timur Bekmambetov, Apollo 18 was directed by Gonzalo López-Gallego, and features Warren Christie, Lloyd Owen, and Ryan Robbins.
As expected, Rupert Wyatt’s Rise of the Planet of the Apes — not Shark Night 3D as per studio estimates — was the no. 4 movie of the 2011 Labor Day weekend. Starring James Franco, Freida Pinto, Andy Serkis, and John Lithgow, Rise of the Planet of the Apes brought in $10.32m.
At no. 5, Shark Night 3D collected $10.12m, or about $200k less than originally estimated. For comparison’s sake: last August, Piranha 3D opened with $10.1m — without the advantage of a 4-day weekend. Directed by David R. Ellis, who handled stunts in movies ranging from Smokey and the Bandit and The Addams Family to Patriot Games and Hotel for Dogs, Shark Night 3D features Sara Paxton, Dustin Milligan, Avatar’s Joel David Moore, Alyssa Diaz, Chris Carmack, Chris Zylka, and Katharine McPhee.
Next in line were the Olivier Megaton-Zoe Saldana action-thriller Colombiana with $9.57m at no. 6, and the Jesse Peretz-Paul Rudd comedy My Idiot Brother with $7.03m at no. 7.
At no. 8, the kiddie adventure comedy Spy Kids: All the Time in the World, featuring Jessica Alba-Jeremy Piven, pulled in $6.8m. That’s about $200k above the original estimates.
Rounding out the top twelve were Katie Holmes-Guy Pearce’s Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark with $6.38m, Neil Patrick Harris-Katy Perry’s The Smurfs with $5.72m, Julianne Moore-Ryan Gosling-Steve Carell-Emma Stone’s Crazy, Stupid, Love with $4.26m, Daniel Radcliffe-Ralph Fiennes-Emma Watson-Rupert Grint’s Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2 with $3.4m.
Gone from the top twelve were Jason Momoa’s Conan the Barbarian, Colin Farrell-Anton Yelchin’s Fright Night, Jesse Eisenberg’s 30 Minutes or Less, and Anne Hathaway-Jim Sturgess‘ One Day.
Among the top twelve movies, The Debt had the highest per-theater average, a low-key $7,038; The Help was close behind with $6,993. The Smurfs had the lowest average, $2,115.
Also among the top twelve (barring newcomers The Debt, Shark Night 3D, and Apollo 18), Colombiana (-8%) and Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark (down an alarming -25%) were the only two movies to be down compared to the previous three-day weekend. Crazy, Stupid, Love posted the highest attendance increase, +37.1%, closely followed by The Help’s +36.8%.
Photo: Shark Night 3D (Steve Dietl / Incentive Film Productions / Relativity Media)