Couples Retreat will be on top but is anybody bold enough to say Paranormal Activity will enter the top 10? is 159 theaters enough? I want credit if it does pull off the upset!

1. Couples Retreat 25.7
2. Zombieland 13.8
3. Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 11
4. Toy Story 3D Double Fea. 7.9
5. Surrogates 3.7
6. Invention of Lying 3.5
7. Capitalism 2.6
8. Whip It 2.4
9. Fame 2.2
10. Paranormal Activity 2.0

1. Couples Retreat 26.1 million
2. Zombieland 12.2 million
3. Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs 11.4 million
4. Toy Story 3D Double Feature 7.7 million
5. Surrogates 3.4 million

My memory of the Couples Retreat trailer is that it looked really lame. We'll see this weekend if the country and I are on the same page.

1. Couples Retreat–$20.9mil. No opening competition. If the reviews weren't so bad, I'd be willing to say $25-30 million.

2. Zombieland–$14.2mil. Drops this weekend are going to be small; it happens every time there's a deficit of opening films, or if the opening films leave a whole lot of audiences in the cold (see the weekend with "Bruno" & "I Love You, Beth Copper", and also the weekend with "Halloween II" & "Final Destination").

3. Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs–$11.8mil. Once it starts making money overseas, I think it's safe to say its budget will be recouped.

4. Toy Story / Toy Story 2 (3D)–$8.2mil.

5. The Invention of Lying–$4.6mil

6. Surrogates–$4.3mil

7. Whip It–$3.1mil. I could see this one having good word of mouth and managing a 15-25% drop, despite its abysmal opening.

8. Capitalism: A Love Story–$2.8mil. Contrary to what some may believe, this is not a disappointment. Why? It's a documentary. Fahrenheit 9/11 was a phenomenon. Anyone who thought Michael Moore could repeat such a success needs to reacquaint oneself with the definition and idea of a phenomenon.

9. Fame (2009) –$2.8mil

10. Paranormal Activity–$2.2mil. I'm going to join JP in predicting an upset. Why? Last weekend this movie made $16000 per theater on 2-3 showings a weekend at midnight. This weekend, its 159 theaters are showing it throughout the day. The theater nearest to me went from 1 showing on Friday & Saturday for the past two weeks to 8 showings, every day of the week. So, despite the 5x theater increase, the PTA may actually stay the same. I'm seeing this tomorrow, by the way (I tried to see it last Saturday, but tickets sold out 7 hours before the showing).

Good article in my local paper yesterday, talking about the stupidity of studios releasing three good comedies on the same weekend last week (yes, he likes "Lying"). "C’mon, folks. It’s not as if there are so many worthwhile comedies out there that we can afford to throw them away."

Here's the link.

1. Couples Retreat – $22.5 million
2. Zombieland – $16.7 million (I believe the fantastic word-of-mouth will help it greatly)
3. Cloudy – $11.1 million (though it could make much more)
4. Toy Stories 3-D – $8.8 million (so, is it still a 2-week engagement after all?)
5. Surrogates – $4.2 million
6. The Invention of Lying – $4.1 million
7. Whip It – $3.2 million
8. Fame – $2.8 million
9. Capitalism – $2.8 million
10. The Informant! – $2.6 million

1.) Couples Retreat – $27.5m
2.) Zombieland – $16.5m

I think Couples Retreat will get $14m.

Going against the grain here, but I think Couples retreat will get at least 32 Million.
Probably 35.
No competition in genre.
Lots of star power.
Popular across a large spectrum of age groups and is rated pg-13.
Twitter and RT rating may kill it though.
Many adds could taint it. They have changed them up lately though. I've been looking forward to this movie since summer, but I'm somewhat cautious that they may have shown all the funny parts in the adds.

Couples Retreat have no competition for number 1 spot. Zombieland will have another good result and Cloudy could cross $100M in the end of this week.

My Prediction:
1: Couples Retreat – $28.3M
2: Zombieland – $14.7M
3: Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs – $11.3M
4: Toy Story Double Feature 3D – $7.8M
5: Sorrugates – $3.8M

This weekend 'Couples Retreat' will test people's box office theories.

The No Competition Theory – a certain # of people are going to the movies this weekend no matter what's playing.

The Critics Matter With Older Audience Theory – Vince
Vaughn and company look to be playing to an older crowd, but older crowds will pay attention to critics, and this movie is only scoring 10% on rotton tomatoes.

The Search Volume Theory – This movie scores #10 in search volume on Yahoo! Impressive.

The PG-13 Theory – Teenagers, please come to our movie.

We'll see. Personally I'm thinking Fail. Are you really telling me that ANY movie they put out without competition will succeed? Hard to believe, or maybe I just don't want to.

#Mileycomeback

Let me state MY theories:

Weekly Average Theory-total box office/# of weeks. Can this week's top 10 live up to it? This shows the true box office "buzz" a film is getting.

Franchise Theory-99% of the time will take #1.

Critically Acclaimed Theory-Good reviews can save a film. Remember Julie and Julia?

Expansion Theory-Expansion of a limited release can score the film up to the top 10.

Genre Theory-Some genres gross higher than others.

Rating Theory-The inappropriate content in a film will affect its audience.

1) Couples Retreat- U$18.6 million
2) Zombieland- U$15.2 million
3) Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs- U$10.9 million
4) Toy Story/ Toy Story 2 (3D)- U$8.0 million
5) Surrogates- U$3.6 million

Paranormal Activity will not hit the top 7 until it expands. They should have put it in a wide release in the first place! It could have scraped in tons!

@JM:

Now I regret predicting only $2.2 million for "Paranormal Activity." To change it now would be cheating because I've just gone to seen it and got to watch it with a sold-out theater at 11:30pm. But I want to say that it's definitely making the Top 10 this weekend.