U.S Box Office Report - 13th - 15th April 2007

1. Disturbia - $23M - $23M
2. Blades of Glory - $14M - $90.1M
3. Meet the Robinsons - $12.1M - $72M
4. Perfect Stranger - $11.5M - $11.5M
5. Are We Done Yet? - $9.2M - $33M
6. Pathinder - $4.8M - $4.8M
7. Wild Hogs - $4.6M - $152.5M
8. The Reaping - $4.5M - $19.7M
9. 300 - $4.3M $- 200M
10. Grindhouse - $4.2M - $19.7M

Six new movies opened this week, with five of them in more than 1100 locations. This has only happened a handful of times in cinematic history and to be honest it doesn't really help anyone. The public find their choices distilled, the studios see their releases vying for attention amongst of a slew of other films and anything that appeared last week can struggle to recover or make more of a headway. It also means that up to six movies that could have been performing well find themselves sitting outside the top ten. As the chart ended up, three of the new releases didn't make the top ten.

The first upset of the week kicks off straight away. Disturbia, a Rear Window clone for the 00s comfortably takes the top spot. Expected to open in second place, perhaps even third, Disturbia displaces Blades of Glory and sees off Perfect Stranger, the Halle Berry/Bruce Willis thriller that was expected to get the top spot. Disturbia has been hyped pretty heavily via Myspace, MTV etc, with Shia Labeouf being pushed as the next big thing (he'll be seen next in Transformers in July and May 2008 in the fourth Indiana Jones movie) and that appears to have worked, bringing in the huge teen demographic and perhaps older audiences looking for a decent thriller. The movie was made cheaply and didn't need to worry about its target market comparing it to Rear Window. It won't stay at the top for long but as a launch product for Labeouf it has performed admirably.

In its third week Blades of Glory slips just one spot and may even see $100M during the coming week. For Ferrell, only Elf & Talledga Nights have taken more money. The movie cost $61M to make and may end up being one of the biggest comedies of the year, alongside Wild Hogs.

With little competition Meet The Robinsons continues to have the under 12 market to itself and was off just 27% from last weekend. The film won't do as well as Disney's previous entry Chicken Little but it was certainly no repeat of last year's March Disney movie 'The Wild'. Meet The Robinsons was retooled when Pixar joined forces with Disney and while it hasn't emulated the success of a Pixar movie, it's no letdown either.

Perfect Stranger opens in fourth place. This little hyped thriller appears to have been dropped into the schedule from out of nowhere - a nervous studio wanting to quickly offload a bit of a turkey? It's certainly a disappointing amount which ever way you look at it. Some of the thriller box office has obviously been taken by Disturbia. Looking further it appears people just weren't that interested in seeing Bruce Willis as a successful businessman who may have killed a friend of investigative reporter Halle Berry. Going undercover at Willis' company Berry enters into an online game of cat & mouse.

Bruce Willis has struggled these past few years (though he hasn't gone down the Wild Hogs path like John Travolta) and this lack of success might explain his return to the Die Hard franchise this summer. Not since Unbreakable has he had a bona fide hit (both Over The Hedge and Sin City had Willis as part of an ensemble cast). Halle Berry has done a little better thanks to her role in the X-Men franchise (though like Willis' movies, it could be argued that that was part of ensemble cast as well) and Die Another Day but she also chose Catwoman and to a lesser degree Gothika. The critical success of Monster's Ball seems a long way away.

Are We Done Yet? is off an impressive 35% from last weekend (when it needed its 5 day total to equal the take of Are We There Yet?) and will finish up with around $55M before leaving the charts. On a less packed week the film might have done better (and it's still way ahead of Grindhouse) but up against six new movies not to mention Blades of Glory, it was always going to have tough second week.

The long-delayed Pathfinder, starring Karl Urban as a Viking adopted by Native American Indians, performs the best of the four remaining new releases but still hardly sets the world alight. With takings so close it may still drop further down the chart once final numbers are released on Monday. Pathfinder's release reeks of contractual obligation. Now in its seventh weekend on the chart Wild Hogs crosses the $150M mark. Slowing in momentum the movie has been a resounding success for all concerned and still has a lucrative DVD market to come.

The Reaping is off a huge amount this week and only its location number has helped it stay in the top ten. Curiously the market that deserted it to see Grindhouse last week seemed to have had second thoughts about it. The Reaping will leave the top ten next week and be on DVD by July, probably in a unrated cut. An unusual choice for two-time Oscar winner Hilary Swank.

Meanwhile 300 crosses the $200M mark in its sixth weekend and probably its last in the top ten. Easily the biggest movie of the year so far, the success of the R-rated 300 should pave the way for an R-rated Watchman movie.

Last week's big disappointment Grindhouse just about manages to stay in the top ten but is off a whopping 63%. Rumours of the film being pulled and re-released as two separate films have spread like wildfire this week and Harvey Weinstein has made no bones about it being a serious disappointment. Grindhouse will leave the chart next week. Will it return?

So, those other three new releases - The Fast & The Furious knock off Redline is at eleven and like Pathfinder (and Slow Burn), probably only saw the inside of a cinema thanks to contractual obligations. Aqua Teen Hunger Force Colon Movie for Theatres was at just 700 locations yet managed $3M. Part of Cartoon Network's Adult Swim, Aqua Teen courted controversy recently after promo billboard hacks where mistaken for terrorist explosive devices. Curiously, the movie received some of the best reviews of the week. Finally, Slow Burn, a thriller made in 2005 and starring Ray Liotta entered the charts at no.16, making just $800k.