Riddick Looks Like It Will Score Less Than One Direction Did in Opening Weekend

Vin Diesel’s Riddick is expected to draw just $18 million this weekend as the week’s #1 movie–that’s about half a million dollars less than One Direction: This Is Us made when it led off last weekend with $18.7 million and marks what Deadline Hollywood is calling the slowest weekend of the box office year.That puts it at #2 on the franchise’s opening weekend standings–Pitch Black opened at $11 million and The Chronicles of Riddick at $24 million. Of course, Pitch Black was the movie that made Diesel a star and so was opening cold, as opposed to having the cache of his personality and a press tour behind it.A modest $900,000 take at the midnight showings on Thursday night/Friday morning was part of the problem, although the week after Labor Day is traditionally not a strong moviegoing weekend.No other movie is projected to make more than $10 million this weekend, with Lee Daniels’ The Butler, We’re The Millers and Instructions Not Included all expected to make between $6 million and $9 million. That’s a trio of over-performers; The Butler was never meant to take #1 against Kick-Ass 2, after all, and We’re the Millers was expected to fade out after a couple of weeks but has remained in the top five for over a month. Instructions Not Included opened last week with by far the best Spanish-language opening weekend in U.S. history.