WEEKEND BOX OFFICE

Several highly publicized films opened last Friday--including Madonna’s “Who’s That Girl”--but none of them did as well as expected; thus the weekend’s box-office crown went instead to James Bond and United Artists’ “The Living Daylights” for the second weekend in a row. The nearly $5 million Cannon’s “Masters of the Universe” earned may not be enough to keep that distributor out of the financial woes it has suffered all year. But “Who’s That Girl”--nearly universally panned by critics--opened very softly for Warner Bros., the film’s distributor, doing only $2.5 million at 944 screens; and writer/director Robert Benton’s “Nadine” (from Tri-Star Pictures) did just a bit more than $2 million at about 760 screens.

* Cannon’s troubles are indicated by the rock-like trajectory of its “Superman IV: The Quest for Peace” (which Warner Bros. contracted to distribute for Cannon). “Superman IV” did decently its first weekend, but grosses have dropped off radically since then; it seems highly unlikely Cannon will see a return on the estimated $15 million it spent producing the film.

Weekend Screens/ Movie gross/ Average (Studio) Total (millions) 1. The Living Daylights $7.7 1,727 (United Artists) $24.8 $4,459 2. Stakeout $5.2 951 (Touchstone/Disney) $6.5 $5,468 3. Masters of the Universe $4.9 1,185 (Cannon) $4.9 $4,135 4. La Bamba $4.5 1,183 (Columbia) $22.0 $3,804 5. The Lost Boys $4.0 1,027 (Warner Bros.) $12.7 $3,895 * Superman IV $1.0 880 (Cannon/Warner Bros.) $13.9 $1,136

Weeks in release 1. 2 2. 1 3. 1 4. 3 5. 2 * 3

Figures courtesy of Exhibitor Relations Co.