'Blind Side' eclipses 'New Moon' with $20M weekend

LOS ANGELES: Sandra Bullock's latest movie has taken the industry by surprise. She stars in the football-inspired drama ``The Blind Side'' that has become the underdog hit of the season with a $20.4 million weekend and a box-office victory over ``The Twilight Saga: New Moon.''

The Warner Bros. sports tale had been runner-up for the previous two weekends to Summit Entertainment's vampire romance ``New Moon,'' which fell to second place with $15.7 million.

Great word-of-mouth from fans has sustained ``The Blind Side,'' in which Bullock plays a woman whose family adopts homeless teen Michael Oher, now a rookie tackle for the Baltimore Ravens.

``How outstanding is it to have a movie at No. 1 in its third weekend?'' said Jeff Goldstein, executive vice president for distribution at Warner, who added that the movie so far has done more than double the business he expected. ``I don't know of anybody who ever saw anything this big.''

``New Moon'' still is far ahead in total gross with $255.6 million domestically, compared with $129.3 million for ``The Blind Side.'' Overseas, ``New Moon'' added $40.7 million to raise its international total to $314.5 million and its worldwide gross to $570.1 million.

``The Blind Side'' and ``New Moon'' fended off a rush of new wide releases that had so-so to abysmal openings.

The nationwide debuts were overshadowed by a huge premiere in limited release for George Clooney's comedy ``Up in the Air,'' which took in nearly $1.2 million at just 15 theaters for a whopping average of $79,000 a cinema.

Directed by Jason Reitman (``Juno''), Paramount's ``Up in the Air'' has earned great reviews and buzz as a potential Academy Awards front-runner, positioning it for a long run in theaters as it expands nationwide over the next few weeks. Clooney plays a corporate hit man addicted to the frequent-flyer life as he travels the country firing people for downsizing companies.

Lionsgate's war-on-terror-themed drama ``Brothers'' debuted at No. 3 with $9.7 million, averaging $4,646 in 2,088 theaters. A remake of a 2004 Danish film, ``Brothers'' stars Tobey Maguire, Natalie Portman and Jake Gyllenhaal in the story of a prisoner of war who returns from Afghanistan to find his sibling has become the man of the house for his family.

Sony's heist thriller ``Armored,'' with Matt Dillon and Laurence Fishburne, premiered with $6.6 million and tied for No. 6, averaging $3,446 in 1,915 theaters.

Another foreign-language remake - Miramax's ``Everybody's Fine,'' with Robert De Niro, Drew Barrymore and Kate Beckinsale in an update of a 1990 Italian film - opened a weak No. 10 with $4 million for an average of $1,888 in 2,133 cinemas. De Niro plays a retiree on a journey to reconnect with his grown children.

The vampire mania over ``New Moon'' did not extend to Full Circle Releasing's bloodsucker comedy ``Transylmania,'' which took in just $274,000 in 1,007 theaters for a dismal average of $272. The movie is a campus-horror spoof about students studying at a Transylvania college overrun by vampires.

Overall revenues came in at $101 million, up 22.6 percent from the same weekend last year, when ``Four Christmases'' was No. 1 with $16.8 million.

Paul Dergarabedian, a box-office analyst, estimates domestic receipts will finish at $10.6 billion for the year, easily surpassing the industry's all-time high of $9.68 billion in 2007.

Revenues stand at $9.66 billion after this weekend, so Hollywood should break that 2007 record in the next couple of days, Dergarabedian said.

With big movies such as James Cameron's sci-fi epic ``Avatar'' opening December 18 and Robert Downey Jr's crime saga ``Sherlock Holmes'' and the family comedy ``Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel'' arriving Christmas week, that $10.6 billion estimate for the year might prove conservative, Dergarabedian said.

``It will probably go higher if we consistently outperform the way we have been,'' Dergarabedian said.