Gravity came in first, Captain Phillips came in second and Carrie came in third. PHOTOS: FILE
LOS ANGELES: 3D outer space thriller Gravity continued to rocket past its box office competition over the weekend, eclipsing newcomer Carrie, to maintain its tight grip on the US and Canadian box offices.
Gravity, starring Sandra Bullock and George Clooney as astronauts stranded in space, grabbed $31 million in ticket sales at North American theatres to hold the top spot for the third consecutive weekend. It had overall ticket sales of more than $170.6 million.
Captain Phillips, a Tom Hanks movie based on a real-life pirate attack, was second with $17.3 million in ticket sales.
Gravity beat the $17 million made by Carrie, which came in third. The re-make of the 1976 horror film starring Sissy Spacek stars 16-year-old Chloe Grace Moretz as the shy girl who wreaks havoc on her tormentors by using her telekinetic powers to destroy her high school prom.
Gravity has become a word-of-mouth darling in its third week in movie theatres. Made for a relatively modest $100 million for a special effects film, Gravity has been boosted by IMAX’s ultra-large screens, which has accounted for $38 million in ticket sales.
Carrie is based on thriller writer Stephen King’s 1974 novel. The novel was first adapted by Brian De Palma and received Academy Award nominations for Spacek and Piper Laurie, who plays her abusive mother.
The film’s box office failed to match Hollywood’s forecasts of a $22 million opening weekend, according to website, Box Office Mojo.
Horror films have had a good year, with Warner Brother’s The Conjuring generating $137.3 million in domestic ticket sales and Mama, The Purge and Insidious Chapter 2 reaping strong sales.
Other new releases didn’t fare as well. The Escape Plan, starring aging action film stars Sylvester Stallone and Arnold Schwarzenegger in a prison escape flick, opened with $9.8 million in ticket sales for fifth place.
The Fifth Estate, a thriller based on the news-leaking website WikiLeaks, was eighth with $1.7 million in ticket sales. The film received mixed reviews from critics and a thumbs-down from WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, who told the New York Times, the film is “a reactionary snoozefest that only the US government could love.”
Published in The Express Tribune, October 22nd, 2013.
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