Brüno is falling faster at the box office than a lead anvil aimed at Wile E. Coyote. After winning last weekend with a $30.4 million take—seemingly solid, but upon closer inspection, a highly tepid $11,040 per theater—Brüno has dropped nearly daily, from first place on Friday to fourth by the middle of this week. The Sacha Baron Cohen comedy clung to second place in daily domestic grosses for Saturday, Sunday, and Monday, behind 3-D family film Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs. But in the battle of the franchises, it slid to third behind the weeks-old sequel Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen on Tuesday. And Wednesday, Brüno was further auf'd by Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince—the new No. 1 thanks to record midnight showings.
Why the quick descent? There were the critical reviews, of course, and our pals at TIME say the Debbie Downer tone on Twitter is to blame. There's also the unfortunate sandwiching in Brüno's release platform—hey there, record-setting summer tentpoles! But the fact that HP6 netted so many ($22.2 million!) midnight viewers is a clue: if a PG-rated kids' movie like Half-Blood Prince is effectively cornering the late-night, adult-aged audience, who's left to see Brüno?
Some sources predict an astonishing $200 million five-day open for HP6. That damning figure, Ice Age's and Transformers's sustained strength, and Friday's indie darling (500) Days of Summer—likely to hook some urban-center audiences (Brüno's only hope)—all mean the Austrian has little chance of even remotely approaching Borat's $128 million stateside haul.
