It’s no surprise that New Year’s Eve was the number one movie in America on Friday: after all, the holiday-themed anthology pic was the rightful heir-apparent after The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn’s impressive three week reign at the top.  What is surprising is how dismal the estimates for the new romantic ensemble are looking.  Far from the robust start that Valentine’s Day saw last February, New Year’s Eve posted just $5.1 million from 3,505 locations.  That means that the star-stuffed confection can now expect a three-day total of $14.5 million – equivalent to Valentine’s Day first Friday and only half of what the studio was hoping for.  Expectations for the weekend’s other new release, The Sitter, were more modest, but even those are proving hard to meet.  The R-rated comedy made an estimated $3.7 million on Friday from 2,750 locations for what should be a weekend total of just over $10 million.  So it looks like last weekend’s record-setting low grosses have decided to stick around: Happy Holidays Hollywood!

Title

Friday

Total

1

New Year’s Eve

$5,080,000

$5.1

2

The Sitter

$3,725,000

$3.7

3

Breaking Dawn Part 1

$2,500,000

$254.1

4

The Muppets

$1,700,000

$60.4

5

Hugo

$1,600,000

$28.9