U.S Box Office Report - 9th - 11th September 2005

1. The Exorcism of Emily Rose - $30.2M $30.2M
2. The 40-Year-Old Virgin - $7.9M $82.3M
3. Transporter 2 - $7.2M $30.1M
4. The Constant Gardener - $4.8M $19.1M
5. Red Eye - $4.6M $51.3M
6. The Man - $4M $4M
7. The Brothers Grimm - $3.3M $33.2M
8. Wedding Crashers - $3.2M $200M
9. Four Brothers - $2.9m $68.2M
10. March of the Penguins - $2.5M $56.8M

Here we go with the first Box office report for a few weeks (thanks to Vemsie for last week's).

The big news this week is the startling business of Exorcism of Emily Rose. A low budgeted film starring Laura Linney. The movie has already recouped its budget by $11M! Based on a supposed true story, the first time in history that the catholic church has officially recognised a possession of a person. It stars The Full Monty's Tom Wilkinson (who is going great guns in the US) as the priest who tries to save Emily, Linney stars as the lawyer who defends him when the exorcism goes wrong.

Elsewhere, last weeks no1, The Transporter pt2 dropped off a fair bit and slipped to the third spot. The movie is just $2m away from recouping it's budget as well. The 40 Year Old Virgin seems to be doing a Wedding Crashers and hold on tight near the top.

The very well reviewed Constant Gardener added a few more screens and lost only 40% of its box office from last week. Another cheaply made film heading quickly into profit.

Holding tight at number 5 is the Wes Craven thriller Red Eye. Which must be his most successful film for some time, especially after the disaster of Cursed.

The only other new entry and certainly a disappointment for all involved, The Man made a very poor $4M. It didn't look good in the trailers and given its time of release, everyone knew it wasn't going to do well and dumped it in the last weeks of summer. Starring Sam L Jackson as a rough cop and Eugene Levy as a guy roped into helping him, it plays out the classic mismatched team but just doesn't work.

The Brothers Grimm continues its trip back down the charts. A disappointment for sure, and an expensive one at that (budgeted at $88M). Again, another case of a movie being dumped into the end of summer. Grimm has been finished for some time, indeed Gilliam has already shot, finished and shown his next movie.

Wedding Crashers, surely the sleeper of the year, passes the $200M mark and still holds in at number 7.

The top ten is rounded out by Four Brother, which took money quickly but dropped off even quicker. Still, it's made a profit so the studio should be happy. March of the Penguins sits nicely at number ten, having now made $56M, cementing its place as second biggest documentary ever.

Two other films in limited release where the Redford/Freeman/Lopez drama, An Unfinished Life and Frodo Gone Bad movie Green St Hooligans. Expect them to open wider in the next week or so.

Next week sees Australian horror Wolf Creek make a show. Lord of War, the interesting looking Nic Cage Drama/comedy about a gun runner, and the Reese Witherspoon Ghost-lite movie, Just Like Heaven. I predict Heaven will open quite big and might just pip Lord of War to the no1 spot. Good alternative programming there. Also in very limited release next week is Burton's Corpse Bride and Elijah Wood drama Everything is Illuminated.