U.S Box Office Report - 24th - 26th February 2006

1. Madea's Family Reunion - $30.2M $30.2M
2. Eight Below - $15.7M $45.1M
3. The Pink Panther - $11.3M $61M
4. Date Movie - $9.22M $33.9M
5. Curious George - $7M $43.1M
6. Firewall - $6.28M $36.9M
7. Final Destination 3 - $5.35M $44.8M
8. Doogal - $3.61M $3.61M
9. Running Scared - $3.08M $3.08M
10. Freedomland - $2.9M $10.8M

Replicating the success of Diary of a Mad Black Woman, Madea's Family Reunion wiped the floor with the competition. The sequel (The character was created by play-write Tyler Perry who dons a dress to play Madea, and also wrote and directed the movie) took even more than it's prequel by $9M. Furthermore the movie only cost $6M to make so is already well into profit, possibly even covering its advertising budget comfortably too. Lastly, the movie is the biggest opener of 2006 so far.

Losing just 22% of business, the snow dogs in peril movie Eight Below continues to perform well as does The Pink Panther, which while not standing up as well as it did last week, still continues to reap in the cash. Sony have got to pleased by it. Only $20M short of the profit as well, the movie is yet to open in many foreign territories. A sequel isn't assured but it's certainly not the flop that was predicted.

Date Movie fails to perform as well as Eight Below, the movie it opened with last weekend, but is still doing very well and is already well into profit. Curious George stands firm at 5 and while not echoing back to the days of the Lion King style profit, this 2D animated movies is still drawing the crowds, possibly because it's the only kid-friendly pic (While Doogal is aimed at kids, it appears to have failed to be an alternative to George) in the top ten.

Firewall tries hard to take money but just isn't doing the business it should. This is a Harrison Ford movie that's still only taken $36M by its third weekend. Certainly not the disaster that K19 but that's hardly a compliment.

Final Destination 3 might be signalling the death knell of this franchise on the surface but it's not going out without a fight, having made $19M more than it's budget in its third week. Yet it is only $2M shy of overall box office total of FD2 and only $9M short of FD's overall box office total. Part 4 might be assured yet.

Next we have the only other new openers this weekend, both grossly underperformed. Doogal is a rejigged and re-dubbed version of The Magic Roundabout which we in the UK saw last year, picked up and reworked on the cheap by The Weinstein company who were obviously hoping for Hoodwinked style business. Not this time. Doogal actually opened on more screens than Madea!

Running Scared was the well publicised thriller that even got a Superbowl trailer. Sadly it appears not to have paid off and the movie took a very disappointing $3M. Did the story turn people off? Paul Walker? The hard edged violence? Maybe the marketing itself killed the movie. At least Walker can sleep easier knowing he has two movies in the top ten, albeit only for a limited time.

Rounding out the top ten is Freedomland. This thriller with strong acting pedigree was pretty much dumped onto the market with what appears to be limited hype and fanfare. Another casualty of an over-packed market and a difficult-to-market movie. Very few movies opened limited this week, the only one of strong note is the well received thriller Tsotsi (it will add more screens next week)