U.S Box Office Report - 29th Sept - 1st Oct 2006

1. Open Season - $23M - $23M
2. The Guardian - $17.7M - $17.7M
3. Jackass Number Two - $14M - $51.5M
4. School for Scoundrels - $9.11M - $9.11M
5. Fearless - $4.7M - $17.8M
6. Gridiron Gang - $4.5M - $33.2M
7. The Illusionist - $2.85M - $31.5M
8. Flyboys - $2.32M - $9.92M
9. The Black Dahlia - $2.07M - $20.7M
10. Little Miss Sunshine - $2.02M - $53.2M

Another week another CGI family orientated comedy. Open Season has a pretty good, if not spectacular opening weekend. The pre-teen market haven't really been catered to directly since August's Barnyard, which didn't open as well as Open Season did but stuck it out for a few weeks in the top ten, eventually turning a production profit. Whether Open Season will perform as well is yet to be seen (the upcoming weeks might not offer alternative movies for kids but there'll still be plenty of new movies to offer competition). For the coming week the movie should continue to perform well and should be approaching $35M by next Friday.

Kevin Costner returns to the top ten with his biggest weekend taking since Waterworld back in 1995. Ashton Kutchner, his Guardian co-star also has the honour of having the 1 & 2 movies this weekend (he provides one of the main voices for Open Season). In his limited 13 movie career Kutchner has had at least half of them take more than $15M. The Guardian sees Kevin Costner as a hardened life guard who is attempting to come to terms with a fatal accident while Ashton Kutchner is the angry young man looking for a career.

Jackass 2 has the expected 50% drop off from last weekend but is already well into profit, possibly even with prints and advertising factored in. Like the first movie, this one was made very cheaply (just $11.5M) and recouped those costs back in the first two days of release. Expect to see a third Jackass movie much quicker than we saw the second.

Billy Bob Thornton could do with a bit of Kevin Costner's luck as School for Scoundrel's struggles to reach $10M. Thornton's last couple of movies haven't done his career any favours, The Ice Harvest & Bad News Bears both under-perfoming. After the success of Napoleon Dynamite, co-star Jon Heder is yet to find a fitting vehicle for his talent and seems happy to play second fiddle for now, as he did with The Benchwarmers and Just Like Heaven. The movie had the comedy genre pretty much to itself this weekend but just couldn't find a big audience.

Fearless dropped a few places and should end its run with around $25M. The movie has taken $47M worldwide as of this weekend. With this being Jet Li's last martial arts film it'll be interesting to see what he does next and if his audience will take to him in another kind of role.

Gridiron Gang recoups its production budget in its third weekend on the chart. While the movie hasn't scored large numbers, it'll become a strong DVD release as most football related movies do. Would the movie have been a bigger success had it been released before the similar themed Invincible?

Sleeper hit The Illusionist actually moves up the charts in its seventh week of release, even after shedding 113 screens from its already low total of just 1300. The movie has nearly doubled its production budget and like Little Miss Sunshine, has benefited from strong word of mouth. As mentioned in previous weeks, The Illusionist is one of the best reviewed films of the year.

Flyboys takes a massive second weekend hit and will be history by next weekend. The film had a very poor opening weekend and stands no chance of recouping its budget even after potential DVD sales have been factored into the equation. Similar, The Black Dahlia has struggled to reach $20M even after a wide opening and an impressive cast. The top ten is rounded out by Little Miss Sunshine, which is still seeing impressive business in its 10th weekend of release and limited screen numbers (the least of any film in the top ten).

Sitting just outside the top ten is another American Football movie, Facing the Giants, which saw $1.4M from just 400 screens, playing well to church groups (who part funded the movie).