April 29, 2013 by Vinnie Leduc
There was just enough Pain & Gain to keep Tom Cruise at bay and prevent Oblivion from repeating. Michael Bay’s action dark comedy, one of our honorable mentions for most anticipated movies of the year, debuted at the domestic box office over the weekend with a few million ahead of reigning champ Oblivion, a sci-fi flick that’s also on our list of most anticipated movies of 2013.
Aside for its title and relatively big budget, there was nothing big about the other new major release over the weekend, The Big Wedding, except that it was a big bomb. Costing reportedly $35 million to make ($10 million more than Pain & Gain‘s budget), the comedy remake that was marketed with an ensemble cast couldn’t even match three-week holdover 42, the Jackie Robinson biopic that scored the biggest baseball film debut ever, and barely overcame animated family flick The Croods, which has been in theaters for twice as many weekends as 42.
This weekend the summer blockbuster season will kick off with a huge blast from Iron Man 3, another one of our most anticipated movies of the year. The Marvel tentpole was released outside of the states over the weekend and has already set some regional records by beating the international opening of The Avengers, which was released at the same time last year. Are we looking at a new box office opening record?
Here were the top five over the weekend via BOM:
- Pain & Gain — Weekend Gross: $20.2 million — Total Gross: $20.2 million (new)
- Oblivion — Weekend Gross: $17.8 million — Total Gross: $65.1 million (#1 last week)
- 42 — Weekend Gross: $10.7 million — Total Gross: $69.0 million (#2 last week)
- The Big Wedding — Weekend Gross: $7.6 million — Total Gross: $7.6 million (new)
- The Croods — Weekend Gross: $6.7 million — Total Gross: $163.2 million (#3 last week)
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