By Christy Lemire
In a battle of summer movie heroes, Captain America topped Harry Potter this weekend at the North American box office.
Paramount Pictures' Captain America: The First Avenger opened at No. 1 with US$65.8 million, according to Sunday studio estimates. The Marvel Comics superhero adventure sets up next summer's all-star blockbuster The Avengers.
Warner Bros' Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2, the eighth and final installment in the boy-wizard franchise, dropped to the second spot. It made just over US$48 million in its second weekend for a domestic total of US$274.1 million.
Don Harris, head of distribution for Paramount, said Captain America exceeded expectations. He figured it would do the same sort of business as X-Men: First Class, which opened with US$55.1 million in June.
"It looked to me, when I saw the marketing on the movie and then saw Captain America, like a throwback movie. It reminded me a little bit of Raiders of the Lost Ark. It had a little bit of a Raiders feel to it, which is one of the best movies of all time," Harris said. "People embrace the look of the character. The character is a little bit like Iron Man - he didn't have a lot of special weapons to himself, he just was a pretty interesting character.
"For it to be the fifth of five superhero movies for the summer, it looks like we got to save the best for last," he said.
Internationally, Captain America: The First Avenger opened only in Italy with US$2.8 million. It will begin playing in 23 international markets next weekend, including the United Kingdom, Russia, Argentina, Brazil, Mexico, Australia and Korea.
Harry Potter dropped 72 percent from its record-setting opening of US$169.2 million last weekend. That was expected, though: Even Warner Bros executives acknowledged that these movies are front-loaded in terms of audience turn-out.
And as box-office analyst Paul Dergarabedian of Hollywood.com pointed out, this final Potter picture made US$43 million in its first midnight showings alone.
"Harry Potter did what it's going to do," Dergarabedian said. "Even trying to keep up with that pace, that level, is really tough."
The strong showing of Captain America made sense, he said. Every superhero movie that's come out this year has opened at No. 1.
"The general consensus was that it was a pretty good movie," Dergarabedian said of Captain America, which scored 73 percent positive reviews on Rotten Tomatoes. "Being the week of Comic-Con, I don't know, maybe that many fan-boys in one place affected the box office. Maybe people had comic books on the brain, superheroes on the brain."
The week's other big release, Friends With Benefits from Sony Screen Gems, opened at No. 3 with US$18.5 million. The romantic comedy stars Justin Timberlake and Mila Kunis as friends who try to maintain a strictly physical relationship. The extremely similar No Strings Attached, starring Ashton Kutcher and Natalie Portman, debuted in January with US$19.7 million.
Opening in limited release, Another Earth made US$78,413 on four screens in New York and Los Angeles. The Fox Searchlight sci-fi romance stars William Mapother and Brit Marling as strangers whose lives intersect after a deadly car crash.
Meanwhile, the 3D Transformers: Dark of the Moon became the highest-grossing movie ever distributed by Paramount Pictures International. It crossed the half-billion-dollar mark with US$62 million from 60 worldwide markets this weekend. Its cumulative overseas gross now stands at US$556.6 million.
Domestically, the third Transformers movie made US$12 million this weekend for a domestic total of US$325.8 million.
Estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at US and Canadian theatres, according to Hollywood.com (all figures in US dollars):
- Captain America: The First Avenger, $65.8 million ($2.8 million international).
- Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2, $48 million ($121.3 million international).
- Friends With Benefits, $18.5 million.
- Transformers: Dark of the Moon, $12 million ($62 million international).
- Horrible Bosses, $11.7 million.
- Zookeeper, $8.7 million.
- Cars 2, $5.7 million ($17.7 million international).
- Winnie the Pooh, $5.1 million.
- Bad Teacher, $2.6 million.
- Midnight in Paris, $1.9 million.
AP