“The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies” topped the box office weekend with $56.2 million over the weekend and 90 million during the first week. Read more on the story after the jump!
“The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies” debuted with $56.2 million during the opening weekend. The movie made a total of $90.6 million since opening on Dec. 17 in the box office according to estimates. Peter Jackson is the director and producer of The Lord of the Rings trilogy and The Hobbit trilogy. “The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies” completely dominated the pre-Christmas box office. Jeff Goldstein, Warner Bros. distribution executive vice president, says, “There have been six visits to Middle-earth, and this is the final one, and it became so important for people to come out to see this in a big way…the action was there, and Peter made a fabulous movie.”
Even though “The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies” is the lowest opening of six of the Hobbit series is was still one of this season’s highest releases. The box office slipped 4% overall compared to the previous year which shows that ticket sales are in a slump during the holidays. Fox distribution chief Chris Aronson says, “I’m shocked that this weekend is a down weekend…we projected that all-industry the weekend would be up. It shows the marketplace is sluggish right now as we get through this last shopping weekend before the holiday.” Another final installment opening in second place was “Night at the Museum: Secret of the Tomb.” The comedy by Fox made $17.3 million, more then previous franchise installments. Sony studio’s, which is still trying to recover from hacking attacks linked to North Korea because of the movie “The Interview”, opened the “Annie” remake in the box office with $16.3 million. “Annie” was originally supposed to debut on Christmas, but Sony moved up its debut in order to create greater awareness during into the holiday season.
