“The Dark Knight Rises” Drops 60%, But Is Still A Blockbuster

Poor Ben Stiller. And Jonah Hill. And Vince Vaughn (I mean, really: Vince Vaughn!). And that hilarious British dude in The Watch. Between the four of them, they should have known that no one is interesting in seeing them take on an alien invader that kills Costco employees when Batman has to contend with Bane, Catwoman, and an existential crisis.

So the box office augurs were right: The Watch is a mega bomb, debuting in third place with a puny $13 million, while The Dark Knight Rises is a mega hit, picking up another $64.1 million and earning a total of $289.1 million domestically since its release ten days ago. This is on top of an overseas gross of $248.2 million, which means it will finish somewhere in the neighborhood of $900 million and $1 billion. Take that, Avatar!

It still hasn’t performed up to par with the last Batman movie and is certainly nowhere near what The Avengers did a couple of months ago, but studios are fine with it since there has been so much negative publicity surrounding the movie since the shooting in Colorado.

The big dance movie that was also among this week’s new releases, Step Up Revolution, took in a so-so $11.8 million. This just might spell the end of the franchise since it seems the announcement of the new cast of ABC’s Dancing with the Stars met with more buzz and excitement than this latest ‘hotties that dance topless’ movie. Well, there’s always Bollywood.

This weekend’s top five releases were as follows;

1. The Dark Knight Rises – $64.1 million
2. Ice Age: Continental Drift – $13.3 million
3. The Watch – $13.0 million
4. Step Up Revolution – $11.8 million
5. Ted – $7.4 million