Fox's 300 parody, MEET THE SPARTANS, edged out RAMBO from Lionsgate in the box office derby for the weekend ended Jan. 27, 2008. MEET THE SPARTANS grabbed an estimated $18.7M vs. RAMBO's estimated $18.1M in their respective debuts. Fox's 27 DRESSES followed in third place with $13.6M and a two-week cume of $45.3M. Dropping to fourth was last week's monster hit, CLOVERFIELD (with vfx from Double Negative and Tippett Studio), which captured $12.7M for Paramount for a two-week cume of $64.2M. UNTRACEABLE from Screen Gems followed in fifth with an opening of $11.2M. Fox Searchlight's Oscar hopeful, JUNO, settled for sixth with $10.3M as it reached $100.1M. The seventh place finisher was Warner Bros.' THE BUCKET LIST with $10.2M and $57.6M. Eighth place belonged to another Oscar hopeful, THERE WILL BE BLOOD (with vfx from ILM), from Paramount Vantage, which garnered $4.8M for a cume of $14.7M. Buena Vista's NATIONAL TREASURE: BOOK OF SECRETS with vfx from Asylum and Fusion CI Studios) followed in ninth with $4.6M and raising its considerable bounty to $205.4M. And coming in 10th was Overture's MAD MONEY, which added $4.6M to its tally of $15.2M.
On the animation front, Universal's VeggieTales movie, THE PIRATES WHO DON'T DO ANYTHING, added $1.2M to its bounty of $10.2M, while Sony Pictures Classics' Oscar-contending PERSEPOLIS added $350,000 and raising its total to $1.3M. Box office information obtained from boxofficemojo.com.
Bill Desowitz, former editor of VFXWorld, is currently the Crafts Editor of IndieWire.
