Kidman and Firth a mismatch

Colin Firth and Nicole Kidman were terrific as a long-married couple who overcame adversity in The Railway Man but Australian audiences aren’t buying their latest on-screen pairing.

Before I Go to Sleep casts Kidman as a 40-year-old woman who wakes up every day with a blank memory. Firth is her husband who tells her they’ve been married for 14 years and Mark Strong is her neuro-psychologist who encourages her to keep a daily video diary so she can help rebuild her life.

The thriller directed by Rowan Joffe, adapted from S. J. Watson’s best-selling novel, may not have sent audiences to sleep but relatively few bothered to turn up as the film fetched $418,000 on a very wide 194 screens.

Nationwide takings dropped by 16% to $9.7 million as none of the other newcomers much enthused cinemagoers, according to Rentrak’s weekend estimates. Distributors say the market is soft and especially shallow below the top three titles.