Scary films draw teens on Super Bowl weekend

‘ Chronicle’ pulls in $ 22 million

Competing horror films and a family movie drew healthy crowds for a Super Bowl weekend as Chronicle topped The Woman in Black and Big Miracle.

Chronicle, the latest lowbudget “found footage” horror entry, claimed $ 22 million, according to studio estimates from industry firm Hollywood. com.

The haul met the high end of expectations and was enough to edge out The Woman in Black, the Daniel Radcliffe chiller. That film made $ 21 million, also near the top end of projections.

The films helped increase overall box office numbers, which rose 10% over January 2011, according to Box Office Mojo.

Though both horror films fared unusually well with critics — Chronicle got a thumbs- up from 85% of critics, and Black scored 63%, according to the movie review amalgam site Rotten tomatoes. com — the weekend got its real boost from teens who love horror.

Gitesh Pandya of Boxoffice guru. com credits Chronicle’s success with “some great trailers and TV spots,” along with a “what- if” scenario of three high school kids with superpowers.

The movie drew strong numbers on Friday and Saturday. Business typically drops off 60% on the Sunday of the big game.

Final figures are reported today.

Tim Briody of Boxoffice prophets. com calls The Woman in Black’s strong performance evidence that Radcliffe is “clearly going to have a very solid post- Harry Potter box- office career.”

Miracle’s future is less certain. Despite strong reviews ( 71% of critics liked it, Rottentomatoes says), the movie earned the lower end of projections at $ 8.4 million, good for fourth place.

Liam Neeson’s The Grey was third with $ 9.5 million. Underworld: Awakening was fifth with $ 5.6 million.

By Alan Markfield, 20th Century Fox Chronicle: Andrew ( Dane Dehaan) succumbs to his darker nature as his telekinetic powers become stronger.