Despicable Me animated weekend movie-going and easily outpaced the competition with an estimated debut gross of $60.3 million. The frame’s other national freshman, the sci-fi Predators, also posted impressive initial returns of $25 million to rank third, with The Twilight Saga: Eclipse weathering the onslaught quite well with a 50% hit that
translated into an additional $32.6 million.

The session also saw potent niche returns including The Girl Who Played with Fire — the second chapter of the Millennium trilogy — which bowed with $932,400. In Quebec, the high flying drama Piche – Entre ciel and terreelevated a lofty $620,000 at 86 venues, and the pound-for-pound favorite was the Sundance preemed alternative family dramady The Kids Are All Right, which rang up a hefty $72,430 average at an initial seven engagements.

The brunt of new films in exclusive release proved generally less impressive, though the American indie Winnebego Man rolled up with an encouraging $19,300 from two initial rest stops. And the Grease Sing-a-long was tuneful with a $77,400 weekend tally at a dozen oiled pit stops.

Overall revenues received a slight bump from the three-day portion of last weekend’s Independence holiday session, but a significant boost from the comparable frame in 2009. Weekend revenues nudged close to $200 million that translated into a 6% uptick from seven days prior and ballooned 39% from 12 months ago. Last year’s leader was the $30.6 million launch of Bruno with the second weekend of Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs close behind with $27.6 million.

Despicable Me, the yarn of an arch villain who can’t disguise a soft core, has had a singular rollercoaster ride getting into the multiplex. The original yarn — and Universal’s first foray into 3D animation — had been generating strong advance buzz. However, its momentum got sideswiped with the announcement that The Last Airbenderwould be retro-fitted stereoscopically and the fight for securing screens with depth turned vicious. Expectation dropped precipitously for Despicable with pundits spit-balling opening box office in the range of $35 million to $40 million. However, interest spiked markedly following the July 4 festivities, though trackers appeared to disbelieve (or at least downplay) the surge.

Summer 2010 has had its fair share of blockbusters with the most recent additions of a buoyant Eclipse and Toy Story 3 racking up numbers this weekend that have catapulted it to the biggest domestic gross ever for a Pixar movie. But the interesting wrinkle of the season is the number of alternative and niche titles that have been able to get a toe hold in the marketplace.

While hardly a new phenomenon (Kiss of the Spider Woman in 1985, et. al) and quite consciously a tactic eyed by every independent distributor, past history has suggested a glass ceiling and limited capacity for anything attempting to provide alternative programming to high profile, ballyhooed summer blockbusters. While spring and fall have myriad examples of niche films that have earned mainstream playdates based on commercial performance, the current period has generally revealed that the multiplexes simply don’t have free screens even for a seeming indie juggernaut.

Final numbers still need to be crunched but it appears that the major film circuits are making room at the inn for the more mature movie goer. The American population has been slowly skewing older and the industry (that generally takes an ostrich stance to such realities) seems uncharacteristically open to at least experiment somewhat to a more variegated marquee. The fact that the likes of Cyrus, Winter’s Bone and I Am Love continue to attract ticket buyers week after week while building screen count could foreshadow the biggest shift in summer programming since the last major seasonal changes in 1978 and 1989. ‘Bout time!

Domestic Market Share: January 1 – July 8, 2010

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