Weekend Box Office: Movie Goers Couldn’t Get Sitters & Stayed Home

Two new movies, New Year’s Eve and The Sitter, plus the third Twilight Saga movie weren’t enough to keep the weekend of December 9 – 11, 2011, from turning into one of the lowest grossing weekends of the year and possible, the worst weekend for Hollywood since 2008.

While the final numbers are still being crunched, the estimates (which are usually extremely close to actual) are in and we have some bombs on the big screen. New Year’s Eve opened with a disappointing $13.7 million while The Sitter followed in second place earning just $10 million in it’s opening weekend. I’m surprised that New Year’s Eve did so poorly because it is packed with stars and doesn’t look terrible. In fact, I’m not ashamed to admit that I sort of want to see it.

The Sitter, on the other hand, looks awful and I hate to say that because I like Jonah Hill. I think the problem with this movie has a lot to do with the marketing campaign. The few commercials that I’ve seen make this look like a twisted, but family-friendly movie, however, Jonah Hill said on a TV talk show that under no circumstances should anyone take their kids to see it. So in other words, they want adults to watch a comedy about kids, without bringing their kids? No thanks.

Here is the Top 10 for the weekend of December 9 – 11, 2011:

1. New Year’s Eve ($13,705,000)
2. The Sitter ($10,000,000)
3. The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 1 ($7,900,000)
4. The Muppets ($7,073,000)
5. Arthur Christmas ($6,600,000)
6. Hugo ($6,125,000)
7. The Descendants ($4,835,000)
8. Happy Feet Two ($3,750,000)
9. Jack and Jill ($3,200,000)
10. Immortals ($2,442,000)

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