Box Office: Jennifer Aniston escapes audiences as 'Bounty Hunter' finds only $7.6 million

udiences weren't as enthusiastic as hoped for about Jennifer Aniston and Gerard Butler's "Bounty Hunter."

Credit: Sony Pictures

Something about "The Bounty Hunter" really didn't click with audiences on Friday.  The romantic comedy thriller starring Jennifer Aniston and Gerard Butler scored only $7.6 million on its opening day, a disappointment considering industry tracking showed higher interest and the expensive advertising campaign Sony Pictures waged.  An expected $21-22 million weekend certainly isn't a disaster, but the long-term outlook won't match Butler's last feisty rom com, "The Ugly Truth," which opened to $27 million and eventually hit $88 million.

"Hunter" was No. 2 on Friday behind a still strong "Alice in Wonderland" (another $9.8 million for $241 million to date), but charging close behind in the third slot was 20th Century Fox's "Diary of a Wimpy Kid."  The mainstream media paid little attention to the adaptation of Jeff Kinney's popular tween book, but the kid flick scored a solid $7.4 million on Friday and after Saturday matinees it should should jump up to second place behind "Alice" with anywhere from $23-25 million for the three-day.

The rest of the top five was putrid to say the least.  Jude Law and Forest Whitaker's "Repo Men" stole any goodwill from the executives at Universal Pictures by debuting with only $2.2 million.  The long-delayed Sci-Fi thriller received negative reviews (perhaps more negative than anyone expected) and is looking at $7-8 million for the weekend.  The marketing crew at Universal did an admirable job trying to make "Repo" look as cool and contemporary as possible, but the word is out that unless Jude Law is positioned next to Robert Downey, Jr., audiences are just not interested (and the title didn't necc. help either).

Fifth place went to the second weekend of "She's Out of My League."  The middling comedy found another $1.9 million.  With only $15.8 million to date, both star Jay Baruchel and distributor Paramount Pictures are no doubt looking forward to what should be a mammoth opening for DreamWorks Animations' "How to Train Your Dragon" next weekend.

Last weekend's highly publicized release of "Remember Me" with Robert Pattinson fell to No. 8 with only $1.2 million.  The drama has grossed only $11.8 million in eight days.

Look for complete box office estimates tomorrow on HitFix.

Gregory Ellwood
Editor-in-Chief, Co-Founder

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With over a decade of experience in the movie industry, Ellwood survived working for two major studios and has written for Variety, MSN and the LA Times. A co-founder of HitFix, Ellwood spends his time relaxing hitting 3’s on the basketball court and following his beloved Clippers.