Box Office Report September 20th

Dude here again. I have a host of new movies, all bright and shiny and just waiting for you, the audience, to unwrap it. Each weekend is like a brand new Christmas (or Boxing Day), with some awesome gifts, like a Boba Fett action figure with working jet packs.

And sometimes you get an ugly sweater.

This weekend, four new presents are unleashed upon us. Do any succeed? Let's go to the numbers, shall we? (All in millions, remember, and these are the studio estimates. The actuals will be available on Monday).

• 1. Cloudy With A Change Of Meatballs (Sony) - $30.1, 3119 screens, week 1, $30.1 total
• 2. The Informant! (WB) - $10.5, 2505 screens, week 1, $10.5 total
• 3. Tyler Perry's I Can Do Bad All By Myself (LGF) - $10.0, 2255 screens, week 2, $37.9 total
• 4. Love Happens (Uni) $8.4, 1898 screens, week 1, $8.4 total
• 5. Jennifer's Body (Fox) - $6.8, 2702 screens, week 1, $6.8 total
• 6. 9 (Focus) - $5.4, 2060 screens, week 2, $22.7 total
• 7. Inglorious Basterds (Wein)- $3.6, 2519 screens, week 5, $109.9 total
• 8. All About Steve (Fox)- $3.4, 2159 screens, week 3, $26.6 total
• 9. Sorority Row (Sum)- $2.4, 2591 screens, week 2, $8.8 total
• 10. The Final Destination (NL)- $2.3, 1805 screens, week 4, $62.3 total

So those are the numbers, but what do they mean? Well, it means that 3D animated food flying at you is just what the doctor ordered! Cloudy took away some 3D screens from The Final Destination, and those larger ticket prices helped account to a lovely weekend opening. Hopefully the sequel will see a crossover potential with An Inconvenient Truth, and have an animated Al Gore preaching the terrors of the "Pepperoni Effect".

The Informant! opened up to a surprising second place. That Matt Damon, people like him. Sure, people like him better when he plays a guy named Jason Bourne, who runs around for two hours straight and kicks a lot dudes' asses and generally handles things. But that's neither here not there.

Love Happens. Audiences don't.

The sad tale of the week belongs to Jennifer's Body, a movie that for some incomprehensible reason has the entire internet seemingly happy at its' demise. The film, which is about a semi-nude Megan Fox killing people and sounding like Juno, wasn't nearly as bad as a lot of critics have put it, but for some reason, a lot of internet folk wanted this movie to fail miserably. And fail it did. (A misguided and barely present marketing campaign might also be to blame).

There you have my amazing break down. Next week, four new movies once again. But one of them has Bruce Willis, and as you all know, he's good in anything.

Until next weekend.......