The Last Exorcism and Takers Open Strong

It may traditionally be one of the slowest times of the year at movie theaters but this weekend saw two new films become instant successes. The Last Exorcism, a horror movie made for a paltry $1.8 million, edged out the ensemble heist movie Takers for the top spot at the box office. The Last Exorcism received generally positive reviews and had a unique marketing which included a Chatroulette campaign that saw the video of reactions go viral that helped to really increase awareness.

In second it was Takers which was made for a relatively low $20 million and it has already earned all of its budget back in just three days.  Though the movie did not garner positive reviews it did seem to benefit from good word of mouth amongst the targeted audience and star power. Takers took in $21 million for the weekend.

The other new opener was Avatar: Special Edition. Featuring nine minutes of new footage and playing only in select 3D and IMAX theaters it wasn’t expected to make a lot of money but did pretty well pulling in $4 million. Most people had already seen the film in theaters or own it on Blu-ray/DVD so for it to even draw that much is yet another achievement for the highest grossing film of all-time at nearly $754 million domestic and $2.8 billion worldwide.

Amongst holdovers the former box office champ of the last two weeks, The Expendables, fell 44% to $9.5 million and has now grossed $82 million. Talk of a sequel has already begun. The absolutely horrendous Vampires Suck fell a heavy 57% to $5.3 million and the number six slot. The Will Ferrell comedy The Other Guys continues to over-perform falling just 35%. It will cross the $100 million mark tomorrow.