.'The Roommate' Poised to Win Box Office During Super Bowl Weekend

Cinemimi[Thursday, February 03, 2011]
The Minka Kelly-Leighton Meester thriller is expected to surpass sales of James Cameron-produced "Sanctum 3D."

Screen Gems' new thriller The Roommate, starring Minka Kelly and Leighton Meester, should draw enough females to win the Super Bowl weekend box-office crown

Universal's underwater cave adventure-thriller Sanctum 3D, exec produced by James Cameron, isn't looking as strong. The R-rated Australian film is underwhelming in tracking and will have to compete with Sunday's game for males.

There's also the weather. Distributors hope the Midwest and parts of the Northeast will have recovered enough from this week's crippling Groundhog Blizzard to allow safe access to the multiplex.

But neither Mother Nature nor the Super Bowl can be blamed for what's expected to be another tepid frame at the domestic box office

The Roommate is expected to open in the low to mid-teens, compared with a $30.5 million opening a year ago for Screen Gems' romantic drama Dear John, starring Amanda Seyfried and Channing Tatum (distributors have long used Super Bowl weekend to bow female-skewing fare).

Universal is predicting a $6 million to $8 million opening for Sanctum, although rival distributors say it should do a bit better. Universal and Relativity Media picked up distribution rights for $12 million, meaning the film needs to ultimately gross $25 million-$30 million.

Among holdovers, Paramount's No Strings Attached should stay high in the mix in its third weekend. The film's gross through Wednesday was $42.4 million. That's true too for the Weinstein Co.'s The King's Speech, which has grossed $74.9 million domestically.

King's Speech and other Oscar front-runners, including Paramount and Skydance Prods.' True Grit and Fox Searchlight's Black Swan, continue their expansion overseas. Speech launches in France, True Grit bows in Mexico and New Zealand, and Swan opens in 12 new markets, including Brazil and Holland.

In the U.S., Sony Pictures Classics expands Mike Leigh's Another Year, nominated for an Oscar for best original screenplay, into a total of 236 theaters.

Sanctum goes out in 2,789 theaters, including more than 2,000 3D runs and 178 Imax theaters. Universal also is opening Sanctum day and date in Australia, New Zealand and the U.K. The film opens in Japan on April 22.