Salt starring Angelina Jolie didn’t make it to number 1 thanks to the growing cultural obsession with Inception (which I liked a lot), but it was number 2 for the weekend bringing in a total of $36.5 million (the budget is estimated to be between $110 and $130). Question: is Salt the first film with a female lead to have a budget over $100 million?
This is the second best opening for a vehicle where Angelina Jolie played the sole lead. Her top opener is 2001′s Tomb Raider. Wanted and Mr & Mrs. Smith both opened at over $50 million.
Salt scored big with women who made up 53% of the audience. 59% of the ticket buyers were over 25.
Other opening weekend numbers include:
$8 million for Ramona and Beezus written by Laurie Craig and directed by Elizabeth Allen. Girls/women made up 75% of the audience with 57% under 25 (that’s a lot of moms attended with their daughters.)
Countdown to Zero directed by Lucy Walker grossed $48,000 with a $16,000 per screen average.
Jean Michel Basquiat: The Radiant Child directed by Tamra Davis has made $27,233 since it opened on Wednesday.
The re-release of Orlando written and directed by Sally Potter grossed $11,448.
Other numbers:
In its 4th weekend, Twilight has now made $279 million in the US.
I am Love starring Tilda Swinton crossed the $3 million mark.
The Kids are All Right co-written and directed by Lisa Cholodenko is thisclose to $5 million with a gross of $4,951,644.
The Girl Who Played With Fire has a total gross of $2,902,265.
Winter’s Bone co-written and directed by Debra Granik has grossed a total of 3,570,911.
Box Office: “Wartime” Has Big NYC Debut; “Kids” Stays Strong (IndieWIRE)
{ 6 comments… read them below or add one }
im so angry and disappointed SALT didnt make number 1. There’s been some obnoxious, sexist responses to SALT from Inception faboys, but I don’t expect any better from such losers.
Thankfully I know people who saw both Salt and Inception, and others who saw Salt over Inception – thankfully.
It does make me incredibly sad this couldn’t have made number one. Maybe better marketing could have helped it? I felt like this film was ignored uyntil about a month where the buzz really picked up. Maybe if we had seen posters for a couple months, and they really worked the russian scandal angle? But I am glad it’s a solid second, and I hope it explodes once its released to international audiences.
“Question: is Salt the first film with a female lead to have a budget over $100 million?”
I’d have to say yes from a very quick glance, but a few are close.
Charlie’s Angels 2 [$120 million] – that may not count because 3 women shared the spotlight?
Catwoman [$100 million]
Tombraider 2 [$95 million] – not there, but close.
One to look out for is Resident Evil: Afterlife. It firmly stars Milla Jovovich, and with the added 3-D that might be another 100 mil, or over budget.
Whether it opened at number 01 is irrelevant. It was clearly a case of another film (Inception) over-performing rather than Salt under-performing. I don’t think anyone was too upset when Sherlock Holmes opened to ‘just $62 million’, even though it was number two for the weekend behind the unstoppable Avatar. As it is, the $36.5 million weekend was the 17th-largest non-number 1 opening weekend ever. Salt had a decent 2.89x weekend multiplier (opening weekend divided by opening day), meaning it played well throughout the weekend and was not terribly frontloaded. As for your question, the first $100 million+ budgeted movie with a female lead was Speed 2, which cost $105 million. Others offhand were both Charlie’s Angels films (about $120 million a piece), Tomb Raider ($110 million), and Catwoman ($100 million). Resident Evil 4 probably didn’t even cost $50 million (that’s not a slam, it’s called smart budgeting for a somewhat niche genre franchise – $110-130 million is way too much to spend on an old-fashioned B-movie). The 3-D process only adds about $5-10 million to the budget, which is one of the reasons it’s so attractive to studios.
Looks like the women directed indies are making their money back. That’s very good news for all of us!
I wish it would have started earlier in the summer.
I’m glad it did well and hoped it would be #1`.
SALT was great. I’ve seen both Inception & SALT.
SALT is the one I’ll see again.
I so excited to see Salt and I Am Love. So glad to see these films doing well. According to the Hollywood Reporter today, Despicable Me was in the No. 1 spot… Which is amazing and wonderful for those of us in animation. NPR also announced Inception in the no. 1 spot with Salt in the no.2 spot. I’m confused about the facts here. I believe Despicable Me is no. 1 at the box office right now.
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