Weekend Box Office: “Taken 2” impresses

“Taken 2,” the wham-bam action sequel starring Liam Neeson as an ex-C.I.A. agent who must once again save his family from kidnappers, opened with an incredibly strong $50 million this weekend, doubling its predecessor’s first weekend gross. Sweetening the deal: the film made an additional $67m in foreign markets, for a worldwide total of $117m, meaning it’s already close to recouping its production budget. “Taken 3” is practically a sure thing now, provided that Neeson is willing to continue to nurse his unlikely late-in-life action-star persona now that he’s eligible to order off the senior menu at most restaurants. The only question: Who’s left to kidnap? Perhaps the three-quel will fast-forward 10 years, when a 70-year-old Neeson saves his grandkid from aggressors, using his dentures as a weapon.

Fellow new release “Pitch Perfect” expanded pretty well after its word-of-mouth-building platform release last weekend, with $14.7m, which is especially solid when one considers that the movie only cost $17m to make. By contrast, Tim Burton’s $39m-budgeted “Frankenweenie” only opened to $11.5m. I predicted it would do nearly double that, but the underwhelming number isn’t surprising given the family film was shot in black-and-white, a medium that alienates mass audiences.

Holdovers “Hotel Transylvania” and “Looper” both held up nicely, dropping around 40 percent each to weekends of $26.3m and $12.2m, respectively. The folks at Sony have got to be happy that both films should become profitable via domestic box office alone — foreign and ancillary grosses will be icing on the cake.

Check out the full top 10 chart below…

No.	Title	Weekend	Per Theater Average	Total
1	“Taken 2”	$50.0M	$13,657	$50.0M
2	“Hotel Transylvania”	$26.3M	$7,846	$76.0M
3	“Pitch Perfect”	$14.7M	$5,307	$21.6M
4	“Looper”	$12.2M	$4,076	$40.3M
5	“Frankenweenie”	$11.5M	$3,827	$11.5M
6	“End of Watch”	$4.0M	$1,688	$32.8M
7	“Trouble with the Curve”	$3.9M	$1,289	$29.7M
8	“House at the End of the Street”	$3.7M	$1,360	$27.5M
9	“The Master”	$1.8M	$2,130	$12.3M
10	“Finding Nemo 3-D”	$1.6M	$891	$39.0M

Source: Box Office Mojo