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'Meet the Parents' Tops Box Office
L O S A N G E L E S, Oct. 8 -- Movie-goers gave a fine reception for thebetrothal comedy Meet the Parents, helping to lift Hollywoodout of the box-office doldrums.
The farce about a jittery prospective son-in-law (Ben Stiller)and his girlfriend’s hard-nosed, overprotective father (Robert DeNiro) debuted as the weekend’s top film with $29.1 million,according to studio estimates today.
It was a record weekend for an October opening, beating the$17.2 million taken in by Antz two years ago. Meet theParents also was a record opening for both De Niro and Stiller.
Denzel Washington’s football-coaching flick Remember theTitans, last weekend’s No. 1 film, held solidly at second placewith $19.6 million, pushing its total to $46.2 million in 10 days.
Get Carter, the hit-man flick starring Sylvester Stallone,opened at No. 3 with $6.7 million. The animated Digimon: TheMovie debuted in fifth place with $4.1 million.
‘Reinvigorating the Marketplace’
Meet the Parents had a strong average of $11,132 a theaterin 2,614 cinemas. Remember the Titans added 836 theaters in itssecond weekend, averaging $7,257 in 2,701 locations.
Hollywood executives were relieved at having two strong films ina single weekend after a string of disappointing debuts. Theoverall box office was down for the 11th straight weekend comparedto last year, but the decline was much smaller than the 20 and 30percent drops the industry had experienced in recent weeks. The top12 films grossed $77 million, down just 4.2 percent from the sameperiod last year.
“These two films are really reinvigorating the marketplace. Ifwe start seeing other films stack up in this range, we’ll get somedepth at the box office,” said Paul Dergarabedian, president ofbox-office tracker Exhibitor Relations.
Meet the Parents director Jay Roach was uncertain about thefilm’s success until he watched it with a paying crowd at a LosAngeles theater and saw the positive reaction.
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