No surprises at the box office

This was, by all accounts, a pretty thin weekend for movie debuts. Just one major motion picture opened (The Best Man Holiday), and we're sandwiched between two blockbuster openings (Thor: The Dark World and The Hunger Games: Catching Fire). Still, movie goers did turn out in force, sending the Thor sequel to the top, once again, but showing a lot of support for Best Man Holiday as well.

All total, Thor: The Dark World took in more than $38 million over the weekend, bringing the film's total domestic take to nearly $147 million. That's impressive, and it's certainly more than enough to best the original Thor in terms of early numbers. In other words, the Marvel cinema dominance continues, with no end in sight. I'm not complaining!

The Best Man Holiday, as I'd expected, wound up in second place, with a very impressive $30.6 million take. It's great news for this comedy, directed by Malcolm D. Lee. Audiences clearly connected with the characters in the first film, The Best Man, and wanted to see what they'd been up to. I didn't see Best Man Holiday this past weekend, but if my friends are any indication, it's apparently really funny.

As for the rest of the weekend box office top five, well, I'm beginning to sound like a broken record here, because there's really nothing new going on. The geriatric comedy Last Vegas finished in third place, taking in nearly $8.9 million. Free Birds, the only major animated family movie out right now, took in $8.3 million for fourth place, and Jackass Presents: Bad Grandpa finished in fifth place with nearly $7.7 million.

Things are about to change in a big way in the top five with this week's highly anticipated Catching Fire release. I also expect we'll see more Oscar hopefuls doing well, with films like Dallas Buyer's Club, 12 Years a Slave and Nebraska all slowly making it into more theaters (hooray!).

Did anyone hit the theater over the weekend? If so, what did you see, and was it a hit or a miss?

Photo courtesy of Hitfix.com