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While hardly a bomb, The Peacemaker, the first feature from the much ballyhooed DreamWorks SKG, didn't exactly blast the competition. The George Clooney-Nicole Kidman thriller, which earned mixed reviews, stole the top spot, but its $12.3 million opening wasn't as atomic as In & Out's $15 million bow on 370 fewer screens the previous weekend. Costing $50 million, Peacemaker should eventually gross $50 million domestically -- and turn a profit once foreign, cable, and video revenues pour in. The movie that did explode out of nowhere was the Fox drama Soul Food. Its solid $11.2 million debut reinforced what Waiting to Exhale's $14 million opening in 1995 suggested -- that there's a hungry African-American audience that Hollywood rarely serves. Two other movies that demonstrate the power of good word of mouth: L.A. Confidential, which fell just 15 percent, and The Full Monty, which dipped only 9 percent.
NO. OF WEEKEND WEEKS GROSS WEEKEND SCREENS PER-SCREEN IN TO TOP 20 GROSS* [**] AVERAGE RELEASE DATE*
1 THE PEACEMAKER DreamWorks $12.3 2,362 $5,213 1 $12.3 2 IN & OUT Paramount $11.2 2,268 $4,949 2 $30.4 3 SOUL FOOD 20th Century Fox $11.2 1,339 $8,363 1 $11.2 4 THE EDGE 20th Century Fox $7.7 2,351 $3,289 1 $7.7 5 THE GAME PolyGram $5.0 2,521 $1,989 3 $35.8 6 L.A. CONFIDENTIAL Warner Bros. $4.4 824 $5,367 2 $11.6 7 WES CRAVEN'S WISHMASTER LIVE Entertainment $3.1 2,502 $1,253 2 $10.8 8 THE FULL MONTY Fox Searchlight $2.8 783 $3,516 7 $14.0 9 A THOUSAND ACRES Touchstone $1.6 1,228 $1,292 2 $5.5 10 G.I. JANE Hollywood $1.3 1,814 $742 6 $44.6 11 AIR FORCE ONE Columbia $1.2 1,540 $790 10 $167.9 12 MONEY TALKS New Line $1.0 1,263 $818 6 $38.7 13 MEN IN BLACK Columbia $0.9 1,080 $840 13 $242.1 14 MY BEST FRIEND'S WEDDING TriStar $0.7 902 $805 15 $122.5 15 GEORGE OF THE JUNGLE Walt Disney $0.7 1,007 $664 11 $100.8 16 CONSPIRACY THEORY Warner Bros. $0.6 1,212 $521 8 $73.6 17 HERCULES Walt Disney $0.6 763 $746 15 $95.0 18 FIRE DOWN BELOW Warner Bros. $0.5 1,019 $455 4 $14.9 19 HOODLUM United Artists $0.4 650 $673 5 $22.8 20 NOTHING TO LOSE Touchstone $0.4 529 $803 11 $43.5
SOURCE: EXHIBITOR RELATIONS CO. INC. WEEKEND OF SEPT. 26-28 *WEEKEND GROSS AND GROSS-TO-DATE FIGURES IN MILLIONS INCLUDES SOME MULTISCREEN THEATERS AND PRINTS SHIPPED AS WELL AS INDIVIDUAL SCREENS
