Weekend Box Office: “Bourne,” “Campaign” end Hollywood’s two-week slump

Ever since “The Dark Knight Rises” took the megaplexes by storm, the box office has been in a relative slump, what with “The Watch” and “Step Up Revolution” bombing two weeks ago and “Total Recall” and “Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Dog Days” underperforming last weekend. Well, that slump just ended, because “The Bourne Legacy” and “The Campaign” both just opened to stellar numbers.

In the case of “Bourne,” clearly audiences didn’t mind Jeremy Renner taking over the lead role from Matt Damon, as this new spin on the series grossed more than “The Bourne Identity,” even when inflation-adjusted. And despite predictably lukewarm word-of-mouth for competitor “The Campaign” (it garnered a ho-hum “B-” CinemaScore), the Warner Bros. release was able to lure in most of Will Ferrell’s usual crowd, despite not really tickling their funny-bones. Even “Hope Springs,” the charming “sex comedy for seniors” starring Meryl Streep and Tommy Lee Jones, put up $15.6m, which is especially strong when considering its lackluster $2.2m Wednesday opening.

How these movies hold up in the long run is another story–my guess is that “Hope Springs” is the only one with less than a 45 percent drop next weekend–but this is a great start for all three and some encouraging news for Hollywood when there has been little recently. Remember: Some even consider “The Dark Knight Rises” a domestic under-performer in that it is extremely unlikely to ascend to its predecessor’s whopping $533m total. (Which is complete BS, in our view, but the narrative is nonetheless circulating…)

Check out the full top 10 chart below…

Source: Box Office Mojo