Universal, Friday Box Office | featured news

Universal's family Easter pic Hop over performed in its domestic box office debut, grossing north of $11 million on Friday and putting it on track to earn at least $35 million, if not more, for the weekend... It was a good day overall at the box office. Summit Entertainment’s Source Code and FilmDistrict’s debut title Insidious also opened well.

Screen Gems is back in good form with thriller The Roommate, which easily beat Universal/Relativity’s 3D Sanctum at the Friday box office in grossing an estimated $6.4 million from 2,534 screens. Sanctum, executive produced by James Cameron, grossed an estimated $3.6 million from 2,787 runs, including more than 2,000 3D runs. The Australian adventure-thriller also is playing in 178 Imax theaters.

Relativity Media’s Season of the Witch opened to an estimated $3.7 million from 2,816 theaters at the Friday box office to place No. 3 behind Paramount’s True Grit -- which all but jumped the $100 million mark -- and Universal’s Little Fockers.

Sources tell me that Vince Vaughn's latest piece of dreck will make geniuses out of Universal's newly installed chairpeople. "Reason? Movies always do business after the studio heads get fired," one studio exec emailed me tonight.