Dark Shadows Can’t Bring Down The Avengers

The Avengers handily overpowered Tim Burton’s Dark Shadows over the weekend, becoming the top film at the box office for the second week running and, incidentally, topping $1 billion at the worldwide box office after only 19 days of release.

The superhero ‘stravaganza’s domestic box office gross of $103.1 million (that’s only its weekend gross, by the way—total domestic is $373.1 million so far) is over three and a half times what poorly reviewed new release Dark Shadows (weekend gross $28.8 million) was able to pull in. Coming in third, meanwhile, was Think Like a Man; its weekend gross of $6.3 million brings its total so far to $81.9 million. Rounding out the top five were The Hunger Games (weekend gross $4.4 million, total gross $386.9 million) and The Lucky One (weekend gross $4 million, total gross $53.7 million).

Out in limited release over the weekend were Girl in Progress ($1.3 million) and The Road ($61,200); The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel expanded to 178 theaters (up from the 27 it debuted in last weekend) and consequently saw its weekend gross take a 260% jump; the John Madden-directed British comedy/drama earned $2.6 million for an impressive per-theater average of $14,888.

Out next weekend and hoping to succeed in bringing down The Avengers where Dark Shadows failed are The Dictator, What to Expect When You’re Expecting and Battleship, the last of which has already pulled in over $125 million since it began coming out in international markets last month. American Animal, Beyond the Black Rainbow, Crooked Arrows, Hysteria, Mansome, Polisse, The Samaritan and Virginia all hit theaters in limited release. MM