Friday Box Office – What the Smurf? THE SMURFS Edge Out COWBOYS AND ALIENS On Opening Day

by     Posted: July 30th, 2011 at 9:01 am

Smurfs-movie-image slice

This week the box office gave us Cowboys and Aliens: a huge action movie directed by Jon Favreau, written by Roberto Orci & Alex Kurtzman and produced by Steven Spielberg. It also gave us The Smurfs: a movie about tiny, animated blue creatures from the eighties which was supposed to play as family-friendly counter-programming to the would-be summer blockbuster. So what’s with that chart?  Opening in 3,750 locations, Cowboys and Aliens was projected to take the weekend with $45-$50 million to The Smurfs $20 million from 3,395 dates.  With Friday’s estimates, however, it now looks like Cowboys will be a first-place disappointment with $40 million while The Smurfs will overperform in second place with at least $30 million.  Meanwhile, the third new release of the week, Crazy Stupid Love, opened in 3,020 locations, taking in an estimated $6.6 million for a weekend projection of $20 million.  Full details and analysis tomorrow.

Title Friday Total
1 The Smurfs $13,300,000 $13.3
2 Cowboys and Aliens $12,990,000 $12.9
3 Captain America $8,000,000 $99.8
4 Harry Potter 7b $6,625,000 $303.1
5 Crazy Stupid Love $6,600,000 $6.6



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  • ipolos

    Damn, that’s really really sad, Cowboys may actually end up opening in second place :P
    What the smurf indeed…

  • Hiro the Eighth Samurai (and 14th Assassin)

    Wow, I second what ipolos said. What the smurf indeed??! :) But I’ll smile a happy smile and go “la-la-la-la-la-la, la la la la la!” down the blue Smurfy road. :P

  • DFT

    Looks worse than that. Cowboys & Aliens will get about $35 mill and will definitely be 2nd place.

    • Hiro the Eighth Samurai (and 14th Assassin)

      One can only hope. :)

    • ipolos

      true true, im surprised collider predicts a no. 1 opening for the movie, everyone else is certain its opening in 2nd…pretty pathetic considering it cost over $160 million to make…

      • Hiro the Eighth Samurai (and 14th Assassin)

        If someone asked me, What’s coming in first? Cowboys & Aliens, or The Smurfs, my initial reaction would be Cowboys. But, as with all family movies, such as The Smurfs, they can pull in a bigger amount of ticket sales because the whole family will go out to see it, as parents tag along with their kids. So, even if a family movie gets bad reviews, it’s still a movie for little, little kids who just want to see silly shenanigans.

        It still will likely be close, with Cowboys still possibly coming in first. But I hope not. I’m tired of these empty-headed actioners, which are all flash, no heart, no substance. After a string of failures and underachievers, maybe, just maybe Hollywood will wake up? I’m not holding my breath… A stubborn lot, Hollywood studios are. Next stop? Akira the Whitewash.

  • Brad

    There is really no mystery. Families are desperate for family friendly movies. Not movies that only fanboys and hipsters are into. Smurfs fills that niche.

  • junierizzle

    It’s not that surprising. Alvin and the Chipmunks was huge. Plus word got out pretty fast that Cowboys and Aliens sucks balls.

  • Ian

    Had high hopes for Cowboys & Aliens, Favreau for the most part makes good stuff.

  • Ash Talon

    It’s not surprising Smurfs wins the weekend. It’s a kids movie and alone at the box office in that regard.

    It’s also not surprising Cowboys & Aliens isn’t lighting up the box office. There wasn’t much buzz about it. Nobody I know is really interested in it.

    It’s unfortunate that Captain America dropped to 3rd. Maybe it’ll rebound a bit, as Smurfs and C&A will certainly drop hard next week. I wonder if Cap will even reach Thor numbers at the box office.

    • ipolos

      i think it’ll get really close to thor’s final gross or even surpass it, it’s already a little ahead…but who knows! Hopefully the Avengers ends up being worth it or else all of these movies have been setting it up for no reason :P
      Joss Whedon, my thoughts are with you :)

  • Huffy

    Meh, unfortunate. Not that Cowboys & Aliens will disappoint; but all accounts it was a massive disappointment considering the talent involved. But it’s a shame that garbage like The Smurfs and Alvin and the Chipmunks continue to clean up, especially when there are genuinely great family films coming out every year from Pixar and even some of the other animation studios.

    • Matt

      When you’re talking about the talent involved, I hope you don’t mean the writers.

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  • nawtnt

    What the smurfs?

    I thought The Smurfs will bombed and Cowboys and Aliens will be 1#.

    Maybe it is the summer holidays and the movie is a kid movie so of course kids would go to watch it, despite it getting negative reviews.

  • Baking cupcakes

    I saw the Smurfs yesterday. The movie was better then the previews lead on it too be, the movie theater where the Smurfs were playing was crowded and about no more seats left open though it was worth it since about every kid in there broke out laughing along with the adults behind me and my brother were sitting

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