It had plenty of word-of-mouth thrust, was boosted by great reviews and the news of water on Mars didn’t hurt. Ridley Scott’s latest, The Martian, soared to the top of the box office charts in the US this weekend with $55 million, according to studio estimates.
With a healthy opening here and elsewhere in the world, the movie has passed $100 million already, though that successful launch wasn’t quite enough to send it beyond the stratosphere of** Gravity**’s early ceiling, which kicked off in 2013 with $55.7 million, meaning The Martian takes second place on the October opening record charts. Still, there’s a chance the final figures could adjust up and Matt Damon’s Mark Watney could science the shit out of the math to nudge the film ahead.
Without any other major wide release competition (we’ll get to **The Walk **later), the charts stayed fairly similar except for a couple of big movers. Hotel Transylvania 2, dislodged from its top spot after one week, fell to second with $33 million, pulling in a healthy $90.5 million so far. Drug cartel drama Sicario was one of the more impressive performers this weekend, adding more than 2,500 screens for a 603% boost in performance which sent it shooting up from 10th to third place with $15 million to date.
The Intern fell from second to fourth, taking in $11.6 million along the way, while Maze Runner: The Scorch Trials rounded out the top five with $7.6 million.
Black Mass continued to do decent business, slipping one place to sixth with $5.9 million, while Everest took a tumble to seventh and $5.5 million. M. Night Shyamalan’s **The Visit **earned an additional $3.9 million at eighth, boosting its total 50 $56.9 million, which, don’t forget, is thanks to a $5 million budget before advertising costs, so that continues to give a great return.
Faith-based melodrama War Room was ninth, earning $2.8 million and stalker thriller The Perfect Guy dropped to 10th with $2.4 million. Robert Zemeckis’ latest effects-packed drama** The Walk **opened in limited release on IMAX cinemas and a few other locales, and took in $1.5 million for 11th place. The studio bean counters will be watching closely to see what effect that has on its full launch next weekend.
To see Matt Damon throw potatoes at the rest of the films in the full chart listings, point your Pathfinder’s camera at Box Office Mojo.