Film News: ‘The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn -- Part 1’ Tops Thanksgiving Box Office

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CHICAGO – In the battle of vampires and puppets, the heartthrobs got the win. To clarify, that’s the vampires. “The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn – Part 1” came in at number one in the weekend box office with $42 million over the weekend and $62.3 million over the five-day Thanksgiving break. The total was enough to hold off “The Muppets,” which brought in a very respectable $29.5 million three-day, $42 million five-day total.

While “Twilight” once again won at the box office, the new films that released for the holiday weekend did very well for themselves. With three new family film releases coupled with “Happy Feet Two” returning to the theaters for a second week, the totals for all four films seemed to even out nicely. We already said “The Muppets” came in at number 2 with $42 million over the five-day period, and the other three films made out the rest of the top five. “Happy Feet Two” came in third with $18.4 million, “Arthur Christmas” was just behind with $17 million, and “Hugo” came in fifth with $15.4 million.

In other box office news, “The Descendants” held its position again at number ten this week when the film opened up further to 433 theaters, significantly increasing its theater count from last week’s 29. This, coupled with two extra days being counted towards its weekend total, is the reason that you will see it was up 676% at the box office this week.

Will “Breaking Dawn – Part 1” top the box office for a third weekend in a row next week? It will have to go up against all the roll overs once again, as well as the new releases “Shame” and “Sleeping Beauty.” Judging by the fact that “Shame” is NC-17 and “Sleeping Beauty” will have a limited release, I’d say the biggest competition will once again come from Kermit, Miss Piggy, and the rest of the Muppet characters.

Five Day Box Office:
1. The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn – Part 1 – $62.3 million – down 55% — $221.3 million total
2. The Muppets– $42 million — new
3. Happy Feet Two — $18.4 million – down 14% — $43.8 million total
4. Arthur Christmas — $17 million – new
5. Hugo — $15.4 million — new
6. Jack and Jill— $14.1 million – up 20% — $57.4 million total
7. Immortals— $12.5 million – up 1% — $68.6 million total
8. Puss in Boots — $10.4 million – down 4% — $135.4 million total
9. Tower Heist – $10.2 million – up 44% — $65.4 million total
10. The Descendants – $9.2 million – up 676% — $10.7 million total

By TIM MARTENS Staff Writer HollywoodChicago.com [email protected]