There’s good news at the Box Office as we head into the all-important summer season. Warner Bros’ “The Great Gatsby” took in $52 million in its Mother’s Day opening weekend but “Iron Man 3”
super-powered its way back to the number 1 slot with a $75 million take on its second week in theaters.

The fourth remake of the 1925 classic novel about the Jazz Age by F. Scott Fitzgerald opened at 3,035 theaters on Friday. The female-driven romantic drama is going strong in spite of getting a CinamaScore of “B” as moviegoers are dressing in 1930s period costumes and spontaneously cheering as Leonardo DiCaprio first pops up on screen. Hollywood executives are speculating that Gatsby is pulling in the original “Titanic” audience.

Warner Brothers is betting that The Great Gatsby, directed by Baz Luhrmann, will offer counterprogramming to the action movies of May. Tinseltown insiders estimate that it pulled in $19.4 million on Thursday and Friday and dropped about 6% to pull in $18 million on Saturday. But it didn’t beat the action of Disney/Marvel’s “Iron Man 3,” which is playing at 4,253 theaters and pulled in $19.7 million on Friday, which was down 72% from its huge opening last Friday, and powered back for a massive $33 million take on Saturday. “Iron Man 3,” starring Robert Downey Jr., has pulled in $794 million so far and its shows no signs of rust. Last year at the time, “The Avengers” pulled in an extraordinary $103 million in its second weekend.

The only other major new release this weekend was the “Tyler Perry Presents” comedy “Peeples,” from Lionsgate, which opened at 2,031 movies this weekend. “Peeples” was produced on a tiny $15 million budget and pulled in $1.1 million on Friday and $1.8 million on Saturday for a weekend opening of $4.2 million. The Tina Gordon-directed comedy got a “B-“ CinemaScore.

Gatsby’s uneven reviews all point to the hip hop score that pulses through the Jazz Age film. The movie included songs by Jay-Z, Beyoncé and Andre 3000. This is the fourth time the novel has been put on celluloid. Warner Baxter starred in the 1926 version, Alan Ladd headed the 1949 cast, and Robert Redford made it his own in 1974. Warner Bros says it cost $160 million but the studio got “tons of rebates” because it shot at Luhrmann’s Australia filming site, which brought it down to $105 million.