Box Office: 'The Maze Runner' Sprints to #1 with $81M Worldwide

1. The Maze Runner- $32.5M
As discussed with +Sandie Angulo Chen on this weekend's Cinema Royale, figuring out which best-selling YA adaptation will make a hit movie is nearly impossible. The Maze Runner, based on the trilogy by James Dashner, didn't start out with The Hunger Games or Divergent level buzz but a smart marketing campaign and a well-received panel at Comic-Con helped it open to a strong $32.5M debut. 20th Century Fox wisely built up the simple premise, a group of boys trapped in a gigantic maze, and reached out to fans of Dylan O'Brien, star of MTV's Teen Wolf. When combined with the $49M international total, the potential franchise has earned $81M worldwide on a budget hovering at around $34M. Those are the kinds of numbers studios love and all but guarantees we'll see the sequel, The Scorch Trials, very soon.
2. A Walk Among the Tombstones- $13.1M
While all of Liam Neeson's movies are promoted to look like Taken in some way, A Walk Among the Tombstones is actually very different. It's not so much an action movie as an old-fashioned crime yarn, and so it's not surprising to see it open to a smallish $13M. That's obviously well below what Neeson's movies have done lately, but at a cost of only $28M that's not too shabby.
3. This is Where I Leave You- $11.8M
Warner Bros. doesn't stray away from big budget tentpoles often anymore, but when they do it's for star studded dramedies like This is Where I Leave You. The family comedy stars Jason Bateman, Tina Fey, Adam Driver, Jane Fonda, and Rose Byrne and looks like any of a million other similar films about offbeat, estranged kin. After some production trouble (the project was halted altogether when Bateman an then-director Adam Shankman split) Bateman and Levy brought it back to life and it seems to have been worth it. While the $11.8M is hardly a big deal, it only cost $18M and will likely play well through the season.
4. No Good Deed- $10.2M/$40.1M
Slipped 58% now that all of the Idris Elba and Taraji P. Henson fans have had their fill of the home invasion thriller. Regardless, the $13M film that was hidden from critics has more than turned a profit.
5. Dolphin Tale 2- $9M/$27M
6. Guardians of the Galaxy- $5.1M/$313.6M
7. Let's Be Cops- $2.67M/$77.1M
8. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles- $2.65M/$185M
9. The Drop- $2M/$7.6M
10. If I Stay- $1.8M/$47.6M

What's not on the list? Kevin Smith's Tusk, which opened to 602 sites and earned a dismal $886K. The oddball horror stars Justin Long as a podcaster who gets kidnapped by a psycho and forced to wear a walrus suit. That's such a tiny amount it can't even be said that Smith's hardcore base turned out for it, and one has to wonder if he'll continue with the loose trilogy this was meant to be the start of. Personally, I hope he doesn't.