Hollywood Stunned by Box-office Success of 'Lone Survivor'

By James Hirsen

"Lone Survivor" just reeled in two-times the box office take than Hollywood experts had been anticipating. A number of executives in the entertainment industry have been trying to figure out why the muscles of "The Legend of Hercules" and the animated charm of "Frozen" couldn’t top a military drama.

"Lone Survivor" tells the true story of a 2005 Navy SEALs mission. The film grossed $38.5 million domestically, according to studio estimates, which made it this past weekend’s #1 movie and put it in the record books as having the second-biggest January debut ever, besting the 1997 hit "Star Wars: Special Edition" ($35 million) and almost beating the 2008 film "Cloverfield" ($40 million). The movie actually had a limited U.S. release on Christmas Day 2013. However, it debuted across all of North America on January 10, 2014. As the Hollywood Reporter recently pointed out, the film’s opening weekend box-office performance was "far more than expected and the best showing of any post-9/11 war film." [more...]