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Let's go over the ground rules. Rule number 1: No touching of the hair or face... AND THAT'S IT! | Photo courtesy of Lionsgate
As expected (due to its wussy PG-13 rating and higher theater count) The Forbidden Kingdom ($20.8M) knocked off the R-rated Forgetting Sarah Marshall ($17.3M) in the opening weekend for both films. Last week's dreary winner Prom Night endured the typical precipitous drop (-56%) but still managed to hold onto third place ($9.1M/$32.5M), well ahead of Al Pacino's latest piece of dreck, 88 Minutes ($6.8M). Hold-overs took the next four spots: the resilient Nim's Island ($5.6M/$32.8M), the essentially racist 21 ($5.5M/$69.9M), the guilty pleasure Street Kings ($4M/$19.8M) and the elephantine Horton Hears a Who! ($3.5M/$144.4M).
In a bit of a surprise, Ben Stein's conservative documentary Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed did reasonably good business in its debut ($3.1M). It edged the plummeting Leatherheads ($3.0M/$26.5M) which should vanish soon. The limited release crowd had a pretty brutal weekend. Where in the World is Osama Bin Laden made the most money, but it's per-theater average was abysmal ($1401). Pathology was even worse ($1086). Its dreadful performance should quickly consign Milo Ventimiglia back to the relative safety of television.