Saw 3-D gets biggest-ever opening

Saw 3-D, the seventh of the torture movies featuring the killer Jigsaw, won the Halloween weekend gorefest, bringing in $24.2 million for Lions Gate Entertainment Corp. in U.S. and Canadian theaters. Paranormal Activity 2 dropped to second with $16.5 million, Hollywood.com Box-Office said today in an e-mailed statement. The latest Saw, the first one shot using three- dimensional technology, benefited by opening a week later than Paranormal Activity 2, the follow-up to last years low- budget hit. Saw 3-D is billed as the last in the series of films that have opened in late October since 2004. Together, the first six brought in about $370 million domestically, according to researcher Box Office Mojo. Saw 3-D did better than the last Saw movie but it didnt restore the franchises former glory, said Brandon Gray, president of Sherman Oaks, California-based Box Office Mojo. The numbers nationally werent terribly exciting, which is to be expected when you only have one new nationwide release. The weekends top 12 films grossed $86.6 million, up 4.5 percent from the same period last year, according to Hollywood.com. This years total increased to $8.78 billion through yesterday, up 3.3 percent from a year earlier. Total attendance is down 1.9 percent.