The heart wants what it wants. And this weekend, the hearts of North American movie audiences wanted to laugh at a raunchy teddy bear, pushing Seth MacFarlane’s “Ted” to the top of the box-office charts with a $54.1 million opening weekend.
Steven Soderbergh’s “Magic Mike” opened in second place with $39.2 million, an entirely respectable take for a movie that people were sure would only attract tittering ladies. (It’s much smarter and more broadly appealing than its marketing campaign, but that message doesn’t always reach the audience in time.)
“Brave” dropped to third place with $34 million, and “Tyler Perry’s Madea’s Witness Protection” opened in fourth with $26.4 million.
Interesting point: Both “Ted” and “Magic Mike” are R-rated features, meaning that movies demonstrably aimed at adults — or, at least, not aimed directly at 12-year-olds — pulled in nearly $100 million this weekend. “The Amazing Spider-Man” will probably make that much money between tonight and Thursday, sending the whole thing back to the kids, but even so, right?
There must be at least a few (okay, maybe a couple) people like me, who would have relegated Magic Mike to being seen when it comes on a movie channel on TV but now want to see it on screen because they heard Soderbergh directed it. There must have been a way to market to both audiences.
Now if only I could convince someone to go see it with me. Not enough tittering ladies in my circle of friends. 🙁
I have the feeling Warner didn’t push the Soderbergh angle harder after “Haywire” failed to set the world on fire — they didn’t want to make “Magic Mike” look any more intellectual or artful than absolutely necessary. Which is a shame, but hopefully the positive word of mouth will pull people in next weekend.
Go see it by yourself! It’s only weird if you make it weird!