Friday Report: ‘Monsters,’ ‘Haunting’ Pack ‘em In
On Friday, Monsters Vs. Aliens and The Haunting in Connecticut had forceful debuts. Monsters landed with an estimated $16.7 million on over 7,000 screens at 4,104 sites, while Haunting grabbed an estimated $9.6 million on approximately 3,500 screens at 2,732 sites.

Monsters Vs. Aliens' opening day came in shy of DreamWorks Animation's previous picture, Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa, which debuted to $17.6 million on roughly 7,100 screens at 4,056 sites, and was much lower than March family benchmark, Ice Age: The Meltdown. (3D-only and IMAX-only grosses were unavailable at this time.) However, it exceeded last March's animated foray, Dr. Seuss' Horton Hears a Who!, which started at $13.3 million. Based on the patterns of those pictures and other antecedents, Monsters Vs. Aliens' weekend is on track to around $55 million, give or take a few million.

The Haunting in Connecticut had a greater opening day than The Unborn (2009) and Boogeyman, and, in terms of attendance, was only slightly behind The Amityville Horror (2005). If Haunting follows a comparable path as those pictures, its opening weekend will come in at $23-25 million.

Also opening, 12 Rounds posted a flabby estimated $1.8 million at 2,331 locations, which was less than the $2.4 million first day of the last vehicle for wrestler John Cena, The Marine. Should 12 Rounds see the same pattern, its first weekend would reach around $5.3 million.

Slotting in at third, Knowing pulled in an estimated $4.6 million, off 49 percent from last Friday and continuing on a similar track as The Forgotten. With a $36.1 million tally in eight days, the fantastical thriller has already surpassed the final grosses of The Number 23 and The Mothman Prophecies.

I Love You, Man held relatively well, down 37 percent to nearly $4 million for $28.4 million in eight days. Both Role Models and Forgetting Sarah Marshall had bigger Friday-to-Friday drops and lower-grossing second Fridays. Duplicity, on the other hand, had a fairly steep 51 percent fall, making an estimated $2.3 million for $20.4 million in eight days.

With Monsters Vs. Aliens aimed squarely at the same audience, Race to Witch Mountain plummeted 60 percent to an estimated $1.5 million for $49.2 million in eight days. Meanwhile, Watchmen's downward spiral didn't let up. The superhero drama tumbled 63 percent to an estimated $750,000, and its total stands at $101.3 million in 22 days.

Related Chart

• Grosses for Friday, Mar. 27