Friday Box Office: God Smites 'Exodus' As Holdovers Tumble

This will be a Friday box office report dealing exclusively with holdover news, because there is just too much for one or even two posts this weekend. I am assuming I won't have this issue come January.

Ridley Scott's Exodus: Gods and Kings dropped a mammoth 74% from last Friday ($8.8 million) to this Friday ($2.275 million). At best the $140m biblical epic will end the weekend with $8m for a 67% drop from last weekend's $24m debut. I tried to be fair last weekend, not wanting to be too quick to condemn the poorly reviewed, highly controversial, and indifferently received Christian Bale/Joel Edgerton adventure to box office doom just on the weekend alone, since December legs can often be a magical thing.

But there were no legs to be found and audiences stayed relatively far away. The 20th Century Fox film has $33.1m thus far and should end its tenth day with $38m domestic. In terms of domestic box office, this one will be lucky to get to $65m, and that's accounting for Christmas pick-up for the religious picture. Now the film has still earned $54m overseas and may-well pick up steam outside of America to save some face. But the film's domestic future is pretty much sealed, alas.

The other wide release from last weekend, Chris Rock's Top Five, sadly didn't do much better even while adding screens. The buzzy and well-reviewed Paramount ( Viacom Inc.) release earned $1 million on 1,300 screens, which was a drop of around 64% from last weekend. Sadly it looks like this one is a one-weekend wonder of sorts, although the film was so cheap (a $12m festival acquisition) that it will probably make money in the end. The picture has earned $9.9m thus far and should end the frame by basically matching its $12m cost.

In better news, Reese Witherspoon's Wild expanded to 1,000 screens and earned a solid $1.175m yesterday. It should end the frame with $4m for a $7m domestic cume. Lions Gate Entertainment's  The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part I earned $2.28m yesterday and should score around $7.8m for the weekend, bringing its cume to $289m domestic as it races towards $650m worldwide.

Nothing else made more than $1 million yesterday, so I'll be brief. Walt Disney's Big Hero 6 earned $883k yesterday, actually out-earning DreamWorks Animation's The Penguins of Madagascar ($875k) and bringing its cume to $187m. It should surpass Wreck It Ralph ($189m) tomorrow. Penguins of Madagascar has thus far earned $61m and will be lucky to make it much past $70m domestic.

Interstellar earned $715k for a $169m domestic cume, while Horrible Bosses 2 earned $670k for a $46.2m cume and The Imitation Game earned $218k yesterday to bring its cume to $2.52m domestic. Finally, in arthouse news, Paul Thomas Anderson's Inherent Vice earned $38k, a horrible 71% drop from last Friday, meaning that the lazy, breezy 1970's PI comedy may have been a "for fans only" one-weekend wonder. But of course, who knows how it will play when it goes wide next month? It has earned $491k thus far.

Okay, that's it for today. Join us tomorrow for more holdover news and weekend estimates and the like.