Revenge is sweet

May 23, 2005 by Ian Evans

Star Wars: Episode III — Revenge of the Sith broke the one day and four-day opening records this weekend to take the top spot at the box office. Since it opened on Thursday, the final installment of the Star Wars saga took in over $158 million. It also beat Shrek 2’s $44.8 million one-day record. Finally, depending how you split hairs, it also broke a three-day record set by Spider-Man taking in $121.4 million in its first three days. If you’re looking at Friday-Saturday three-day tallies, Spidey’s $114.8 million still holds.

Okay, so much for the math lesson. Despite the Sith juggernaut, the weekend box office was still down 3.5% from last year, continuing the ’05 slump. The cause this wekend was less than stellar performances by films that didn’t feature Jedis.

J Fo and J Lo’s Monster-In-Law took in an estimated $14.3 million this weekend, while the Will Ferrell/Robert Duvall flick Kicking & Screaming made $10.7 million in its second weekend.

The indie film Crash added another $5.5 million to its take, while Jet Li and Unleashed rounded out the top five with $4.1 million.