Skip to footer

Maze Runner: Box office weekend winner with $32.5 million

Maze Runner box office take was almost triple the box office revenue of Liam Neeson's 'A Walk Among the Tombstones.' The Maze Runner only cost $34 million to make.

  • By Jake Coyle Associated Press

| New York

The young-adult adaptation "The Maze Runner" raced to the top of the box-office with $32.5 million, giving a budding franchise a quick start out of the gate.

The 20th Century Fox release easily outpaced the $13.1 million debut of Liam Neeson's hardboiled private eye thriller "A Walk Among the Tombstones" and the $11.9 million opening for the ensemble-cast dramedy "This Is Where I Leave You," according to studio estimates Sunday.

The strong opening for "The Maze Runner," adapted from James Dashner's science-fiction YA novel, is a big success for a movie that cost $34 million to make and was released in the normally quiet month of September. Fox aimed to make the film — about a group of teenage boys mysteriously locked inside a giant maze — the first post-summer event movie, putting it on IMAX and large-format screens.

"Our little $34 million-budgeted film is pretty darn strong," said Chris Aronson, head of distribution for Fox. "No one had launched a YA title in September. We took a risk, but it paid off.

Aronson said attracting young moviegoers has been "the Achilles heel" of Hollywood in recent years. But the studio has recently found success with relatively low-budget YA releases, like "The Fault in Our Stars," the Shailene Woodley melodrama that made $125 million earlier this year despite a budget of just $12 million.

"It shows the pitch-perfect strategic planning of Fox," said Paul Dergarabedian, senior media analyst for box-office tracker Rentrak. "Teenagers are probably the most fickle creatures on the planet to figure out. So marketing to this particular group is tricky and there have been a lot of casualties in this YA war."

But "The Maze Runner," which drew a 51 percent female audience despite an almost all-male cast, is now a promising franchise. Its opening was further boosted by $37.6 million internationally. Aronson announced Sunday that the planned sequel, "The Maze Runner: The Scorch Trials," will bow Sept. 18 next year.

While Neeson's box-office strength has been hard to beat in recent years, Universal's darker, R-rated "A Walk Among the Tombstones" came in well below the track record established by his "Taken" series or, from earlier this year, "Non-Stop." Neeson stars as a justice-seeking former NYPD detective.

Warner Bros.' "This Is Where I Leave You," about a large suburban family sitting Shiva for the funeral of their patriarch, boasted an A-list ensemble cast including Tina Fey, Jason Bateman and Jane Fonda.

But such adult fare rarely lights up the box office, even when directed by a filmmaker with a proven record of attracting crowds. The film, adapted from Jonathan Trooper's best seller, was directed by Shawn Levy, who is best known for broader comedies like the "Night at the Museum" franchise.

Estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at U.S. and Canadian theaters, according to Rentrak. Where available, the latest international numbers are also included. Final domestic figures will be released Monday.

1. "The Maze Runner," $32.5 million ($37.6 million international).

2. "A Walk Among the Tombstones," $13.1 million ($5 million international).

3. "This Is Where I Leave You," $11.9 million.

4. "No Good Deed," $10.2 million.

5. "Dolphin Tale 2," $9 million ($1.2 million international).

6. "Guardians of the Galaxy," $5.2 million ($5.2 million international).

7. "Let's Be Cops," $2.7 million ($1.5 million international).

8. "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles," $2.7 million ($7.3 million international).

9. "The Drop," $2.1 million.

10. "If I Stay," $1.8 million ($3.2 million international).

___

Estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at international theaters (excluding the U.S. and Canada), according to Rentrak:

1. "The Maze Runner," $37.6 million.

2. "Lucy," $13 million.

3. "The Dawn of the Planet of the Apes," $8.2 million.

4. "Sex Tape," $7.6 million.

5. "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles," $7.3 million.

6. "Non-Stop," $7 million.

7. "One Step Away," $6 million.

8. "Into the Storm," $5.7 million.

9. "Guardians of the Galaxy," $5.2 million.

(tie) "Hercules," $5.2 million.

___

Universal and Focus are owned by NBC Universal, a unit of Comcast Corp.; Sony, Columbia, Sony Screen Gems and Sony Pictures Classics are units of Sony Corp.; Paramount is owned by Viacom Inc.; Disney, Pixar and Marvel are owned by The Walt Disney Co.; Miramax is owned by Filmyard Holdings LLC; 20th Century Fox and Fox Searchlight are owned by 21st Century Fox; Warner Bros. and New Line are units of Time Warner Inc.; MGM is owned by a group of former creditors including Highland Capital, Anchorage Advisors and Carl Icahn; Lionsgate is owned by Lions Gate Entertainment Corp.; IFC is owned by AMC Networks Inc.; Rogue is owned by Relativity Media LLC.

___

Follow AP Film Writer Jake Coyle on Twitter at: http://twitter.com/jakecoyleAP.

Copyright 2014 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.
editor@csmonitor.com
Subscribe
Mark Sappenfield
Editor

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

Subscribe to insightful journalism

QR Code to Maze Runner: Box office weekend winner with $32.5 million
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/The-Culture/Latest-News-Wires/2014/0922/Maze-Runner-Box-office-weekend-winner-with-32.5-million
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe