Dane DeHaan in scene from movie "Chronicle", 20th Century Fox
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 low-budget "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 Black, the Daniel Radcliffe chiller. That film did $21 million, also near the top end of projections.
The films continued to boost box office, which rose 10% over January 2011, according to Box Office Mojo.
While both horror films did unusually well with critics -Chronicle got a thumbs-up from 85% of critics, while Black scored 63%, according to amalgam site Rottentomatoes.com - the weekend got its real boost from teens, who love horror and aren't Super Bowl fanatics.
Gitesh Pandya of Boxofficeguru.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 that drew strong numbers on Friday and Saturday. Business typically drops off 60% on Sundays because of the big game; final figures are due Monday.
Tim Briody of Boxofficeprophets.com calls 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 Scott Bowles, USA TODAY