‘Black Hawk Down’ Holds On to Prime Territory

A slow Super Bowl weekend at theaters helped lift “Black Hawk Down” to another box-office victory as the combat thriller took in $11.5 million to remain the No. 1 film for the third straight weekend.

Only a couple of fresh movies were released, leaving the top 10 largely the same as last week, when studios dumped out a rush of new films.

“Snow Dogs” was No. 2 for the third weekend in a row, grossing $9.9 million, according to studio estimates Sunday. The rest of the top five were bunched tightly, with “The Count of Monte Cristo” at $9 million, “A Walk to Remember” at $8.8 million and “A Beautiful Mind” at $8.5 million.

The gross-out campus comedy “Slackers” debuted weakly with $3 million, tying for No. 10 with “Orange County.” Playing in 1,893 theaters, “Slackers” averaged just $1,585, compared with $3,659 in 3,143 theaters for “Black Hawk Down.”

Nicole Kidman’s latest, “Birthday Girl,” took in $2.5 million in 1,000 theaters for a $2,500 average. Kidman plays a Russian mail-order bride whose arrival wrecks the life of a lonely British bank clerk (Ben Chaplin).

“The newcomers couldn’t get arrested this weekend,” said Paul Dergarabedian, president of Exhibitor Relations, which tracks the box office.

“Black Hawk Down,” director Ridley Scott’s fiery dramatization of a U.S. military operation gone awry in Somalia, has taken in $75.5 million. The film was in its third weekend of wide release after a limited debut in December.

Distributor Sony provided 15 videotape copies to the Defense Department for soldiers in Afghanistan to watch, said studio spokesman Steve Elzer.

Because of the Super Bowl, studios lowered estimates for Sunday film revenues, expecting the game to keep audiences at home. Sony figured ticket sales for “Black Hawk Down” on Sunday would be off about 65% from Saturday. The normal drop between Saturday and Sunday would be 35 to 40%, said Jeff Blake, Sony president of worldwide marketing and distribution.

“The bottom line for the Super Bowl is it’s a slow moviegoing day,” Blake said.

Still, weekend revenues rose. The top 12 movies grossed $80.6 million, up 11% from the same period a year ago, which was a non-Super Bowl weekend.

With a $267.1 million total so far domestically, “The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring” will pass “Shrek” this week to become the second-highest-grossing film released in 2001. “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone” was No. 1 at $312.9 million and counting.

“A Beautiful Mind” climbed to $104.6 million, the 18th film released last year to cross the $100-million mark.