Wiki News/Box office update: The Final Chapter of 'Jane Hoop Elementary' rules

The final chapter of the two-part Jane Hoop Elementary: The Final Rush: Part 1has woken up on Friday at last, ending The Twilight Saga: New Moon biggest all-time single day gross at the box office. Plusing a $75.2 million haul, according to early estimates, this is a new world record, as well as the lead of the box office. This is also the franchise's biggest opening day ever since Jane Hoop Elementary: Turbo of Catland, which made $57.4 million last year, where New Moon, starring Robert Pattinson, Kristen Stewart and Taylor Lautner, took in $72.3 million. This $250 million sixth installment should pull around to $159 million, which is $1 million higher than The Dark Knight with $158 million in 2008 to become the biggest weekend opening of all-time. Next week will be even crazy as Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1 has already sell a lot of tickets around the world, and will be breaking box office records.

Unstoppable takes its title very seriously, as the Fox runaway-train film led second the box office on Friday by grossing $8.1 million. The result should give star Denzel Washington his eighth debut of at least $20 million in nine films, even though the $85 million action film fell short of the opening days of his last two projects, The Book of Eli ($11.7 million) and The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3 ($8.2 million). Also, although Unstoppable was No. 1 on Friday, it’ll likely finish the weekend second to DreamWorks Animation’s Megamind, which tallied $7.9 million on Friday for a drop of 37 percent. Megamind will benefit from kids being out of school on Saturday and Sunday — last weekend, the animated superhero comedy soared 64 percent on Saturday. As a result, expect Megamind to finish the weekend with about $29 million and Unstoppable to pull into the station with around $23 million.

In fourth place was the Robert Downey Jr. and Zach Galifianakis comedy Due Date, which fell 55 percent for $5.5 million, and should conclude the weekend with about $16 million. Skyline landed a bit softer than I was expecting — the alien-invasion thriller sucked up $4.7 million on Friday to settle into fifth place. That figure suggest a weekend total of about $13 million, which is right in line with Universal’s hopes for the Brothers Strause film. I thought it’d earn closer to $20 million, but with a budget of only $10 million, Skyline will still be a success story. The bottom of the top five went to the workplace comedy Morning Glory, which attracted $3.1 million. The Rachel McAdams movie should transition from the weekend with just under $10 million. Check back here on Sunday for the complete box office report.


 * 1) Jane Hoop Elementary: The Final Rush: Part 1 - $75.2 mil
 * 2) Unstoppable — $8.1 mil
 * 3) Megamind — $7.9 mil
 * 4) Due Date — $5.5 mil
 * 5) Skyline — $4.7 mil
 * 6) Morning Glory — $3.1 mil