‘Bourne,’ ‘Campaign,’ ‘Hope Springs’ all enjoy solid starts

LOS ANGELES — Hollywood didn’t so much celebrate this weekend as breathe a sigh of relief.

Three new movies — “The Bourne Legacy,” “The Campaign” and “Hope Springs” — opened right around where their studio backers had hoped. All fell well short of out-of-the-gate hit status but none flopped, leaving plenty of hope that they could turn into financial successes.

“Bourne” opened to a studio-estimated $40.3 million in the United States and Canada, while “The Campaign” took in $27.4 million and “Hope Springs,” which opened Wednesday, grossed $20.1 million over five days.

With “Bourne” and “Hope Springs” both getting an average audience grade of B, according to market research firm CinemaScore, and “The Campaign” a B-minus, there’s little evidence yet to judge which of the movies may have a long box-office life and which might quickly fizzle.

The biggest risk going into the weekend was “Bourne,” a fresh take on the franchise on which Universal Pictures and Relativity Media spent about $130 million. In addition to a new direction for the story, Matt Damon was replaced as star by Jeremy Renner, in his first leading role for a tentpole picture.

The opening was well below that of the last two “Bourne” movies. However, other recent films that restarted franchises, such as “X-Men: First Class” and the James Bond movie “Casino Royale,” saw similar drops but were good enough to generate sequels.