BOX OFFICE REPORT (DEC. 13-15): 'The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug' Rules the Weekend

1. The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug (NR)
Weekend gross: $73.7 million / Total domestic gross: $73.7 million / 
Percent drop: NA
The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug led the weekend at the box office, but failed to live up to last year's The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey. The latest movie in Peter Jackson's The Hobbit/Lord of the Rings saga opened to $73.7 million, which trailed An Unexpected Journey's $84.6 million. Overall though, The Desolation of Smaug's opening weekend still trumped all three opening weekends of the original Lord of the Rings trilogy. It looks like Warner Bros. decision to move The Hobbit from a duology to a trilogy was a smart move.

2. Frozen (1st)

Weekend gross: $22.2 million / Total domestic gross: $164.4 million / 
Percent drop: 29.8
Frozen is rapidly moving up the charts when it comes to the domestic gross of movies under the Second Disney Renaissance. Frozen's $164.4 million still trails Tangled and Wreck-It Ralph's lifetime grosses, but Frozen definitely seems to have the momentum to keep it going, with the possibility of eventually passing those other two Disney animated films. Frozen already benefited from the Thanksgiving crowds and looks like it'll take advantage of Christmas too.

3. Tyler Perry's A Madea Christmas (NR)

Weekend gross: $16.0 million / Total domestic gross: $16.0 million / 
Percent drop: NA
Tyler Perry's A Madea Christmas managed to open above The Hunger Games: Catching Fire, but was unable to live up to previous Tyler Perry opening weekends. A Madea Christmas' opening number is only the sixteenth best for Tyler Perry movies, which continues a downward trend the brand has been experiencing lately. In 2009, Tyler Perry's Madea Goes to Jail opened to a whopping $90.5 million, but since then, Perry's movies have been unable to reach such heights. Have people grown tired of Madea?

4. The Hunger Games: Catching Fire (2nd)

Weekend gross: $13.2 million / Total domestic gross: $357.0 million / 
Percent drop: 49.8
For the second weekend in a row, The Hunger Games: Catching Fire performed behind the weekend box office performance of the first Hunger Games movie. Catching Fire outperformed its predecessor its first two weekends, but since then, the sequel has lagged behind. For this weekend, it wasn't just behind by a little — Catching Fire's $13.2 million weekend was way behind The Hunger Games' $21.1 million fourth weekend.

5. Thor: The Dark World (4th)

Weekend gross: $2.7 million / Total domestic gross: $198.1 million / 
Percent drop: 43.9

Unless the world stops sometime over the next few days, Thor: The Dark World will break the $200 million barrier. In doing so, the Thor sequel will become the fifth Marvel Cinematic Universe movie to accomplish the feat, joining The Avengers and the three Iron Man films.

Next week's predictions

1. The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

2. The Wolf of Wall Street

3. American Hustle

4. Frozen

5. The Hunger Games: Catching Fire

SOURCE: Box Office Mojo