Weekend Box Office: October 4-6

Courtesy of Box Office Mojo:

1.  Gravity - $55.6 million

2.  Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs 2 - $21.5 million

3.  Runner Runner - $7.6 million

4.  Prisoners - $5.7 million

5.  Rush - $4.4 million

6.  Don Jon - $4.16 million

7.  Baggage Claim - $4.12 million

8.  Insidious Chapter 2 - $3.8 million

9.  Pulling Strings - $2.5 million

10.  Enough Said - $2.1 million

Let's dispense with the inevitable space puns and get right to the point:  Gravity is a big hit.  With an estimated $55.6 million for the weekend, it becomes October's highest opening weekend and career-best opening weekends for both stars Sandra Bullock and George Clooney.  That's right...this weekend saw the end of the hilarity that was Clooney's biggest opening weekend being Batman & Robin.  But when you combine the audience appeal of both Bullock and Clooney, along with visuals that need to be seen in IMAX/3D, this is the kind of weekend that should happen for a movie like this.

Meanwhile, Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs 2 remained popular with the family crowd, dropping just 37% to earn another $21.5 million.  The animated sequel has earned $60.6 million domestically so far, and is well on its way to pass $100 million at some point this month.

Speaking of audience appeal, Runner Runner had none.  The epic pairing of Ben Affleck and Justin Timberlake (sarcasm heavily implied) didn't seem to interest audience at all this weekend, sputtering in theaters with just $7.6 million.

Prisoners continues to do well, taking fourth place with $5.7 million, and bringing its domestic total up to $46 million.  Rush, which had a so-so opening last week, dropped a not-so-good 56% in its second weekend, earning only $4.4 million.  Don Jon and Baggage Claim didn't gather too much interest this weekend either, as they virtually tied with about $4 million apiece.

Next weekend sees another Oscar hopeful, Captain Phillips (starring two-time Oscar winner Tom Hanks), as well as Machete Kills, which won't be winning anything at awards time.