Everyone’s Disappointed by ‘This Is It’ $100 Million Box Office Haul

Apparently all that candy and booze still hasn't mitigated the crushing sorrow of a universe still mourning the loss of its Last True Pop Icon. And all those tears have helped to cultivate some fat banyan trees of box office profits for Sony Pictures, the distributor shilling This Is It domestically and abroad. The documentary hauled in over $20 million over the weekend, bring its total tally to over $100 million since its release on Wednesday. But there's shame! That is, most of those profits (more than two-thirds) come from about 97 other countries. Meaning that if we, as good, goddess-fearing Americans who write threadbare puffpieces about how we fail to follow through with basic obligations are going to insist on blubbering about how Michael Jackson has passed, we need not half-ass our anguish.

But y’all know who is having an all-American attitude about this big payday? Sony Pictures. Ever the optimists, the studio says that this number is decidedly on the “low-end” of their estimates and they chalk it up to Halloween, what with all of us being stuck in line for a party no one could get into and therefore unable to run pay tribute to our dearly departed king.

The wide-eyed suits have big dreams, though! Like Judy Garland hopping aboard a trolley. They’re expecting the film to top $200 million worldwide as Jackson’s posthumous farewell tour winds down. They’re also clearly not aware that the rest of the world remains mired in recession-related agony.

This is all relative though. America this week decided they did not care for a missing pilot and Vince Vaughn, as their respective films fell less than 50%.