Ben Stiller Beats Down Terminator Salvation

Terminator Salvation isn’t being terminated exactly. But it is being denied.

Ben Stiller’s Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian, not the latest Terminator film, was winning the Memorial Day weekend box office. And it wasn’t all that close.

Smithsonian is estimated to gross $53.5 million from Friday-Sunday; Salvation is down for $43 million for the same stretch.

Four-day weekend estimates will be out tomorrow.

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Ben Stiller

“I think most people felt Terminator was going to win the weekend,” Chris Aronson, an exec for Smithsonian’s Fox, said today. “I think it’s a testament to comedy is king.”

If estimates hold, Salvation’s initial three-day weekend gross will be $1 million less than Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines took in six summers ago. Since opening Thursday, one full day ahead of Smithsonian, it’s only made about $3 million more than the comedy and looks to fall short of its reputed $200 million budget on the domestic side.

Drilling down into the numbers:

• Smithsonian is Stiller’s biggest-opening live-action (read: non-Madagascar) movie ever. And it’s more than $20 million bigger than the original Night at the Museum’s Friday-Sunday debut in 2006.

• On Friday, Smithsonian’s margin of victory over Salvation was slim: Less than $500,000 separated the two movies. On Saturday, Smithsonian’s business jumped 30 percent; Salvation’s dipped about 2 percent—and the rout was on. -Sampurn

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Tags: Ben Stiller, Chris Aronson, Salvation, Smithsonian

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