Tahar Rahim, Jamie Bell, Channing Tatum, The Eagle
The Jennifer Aniston-Adam Sandler comedy Just Go with It once topped the US/Canada box office on Thursday, Feb. 17, with $1.88m, according to Box Office Mojo.
This President’s Day weekend, Just Go with It will be competing with the Alex Pettyfer vehicle I Am Number Four, the Liam Neeson action-thriller Unknown, and the even more lowbrow comedy Big Mommas: Like Father Like Son, starring Martin Lawrence. Pundits expect Pettyfer’s action-horror thriller I Am Number Four to top the North American box-office chart.
At no. 2 on Thursday, Gnomeo & Juliet, which features songs by Elton John and the voices of James McAvoy, Emily Blunt, Michael Caine, Matt Lucas, and Maggie Smith, collected $1.01m.
At no. 3, the 3D Justin Bieber documentary Justin Bieber: Never Say Never grossed $959k.
Tom Hooper’s The King’s Speech, starring Colin Firth, Geoffrey Rush, and Helena Bonham Carter, drew $643k at no. 4.
At no. 5, The Eagle earned 534k. Directed by Kevin Macdonald, the period actioner stars Channing Tatum, Jamie Bell, Mark Strong, Tahar Rahim, and Donald Sutherland.
Next in line were the Natalie Portman-Ashton Kutcher romantic comedy No Strings Attached with $435k at no. 6 and the thriller The Roommate, featuring Leighton Meester and Minka Kelly, with $403k at no. 7.
The 3D underwater adventure movie Sanctum brought in $390k at no. 8.
Rounding out the top twelve were Joel Coen and Ethan Coen’s True Grit with $274k, Jason Statham-Ben Foster’s The Mechanic with $267k, Anthony Hopkins-Colin O’Donoghue’s The Rite with $236k, Seth Rogen-Jay Chou’s The Green Hornet with $235k.
Among the top-twelve movies, Just Go with It had the highest per-theater average, $531. The Rite had the lowest, $107.
Ten of the top twelve movies posted attendance gains on Thursday. The two that were (only slightly) down were The Rite, -1%, and Sanctum, -0.1%. Among the top twelve, Gnomeo & Juliet posted the highest Wednesday-to-Thursday gains, +16%. The Mechanic posted the lowest, +1%.
Photo: The Eagle (Keith Bernstein / Focus Features)