Inception Continues Its Reign, Puts Wound In Salt

Christopher Nolan's follow-up to The Dark Knight, Inception, has taken box office gold for the second weekend in a row.  Riding a wave of good reviews and great word of mouth, the Leonardo DiCaprio-starring thriller dropped only 30% in its second weekend, adding $43.5 million to its total for $143.6 million in two weeks.

Second place went to Angelina Jolie's latest action flick, Salt.  The film brought in $36.5 million in its opening weekend for distributor Sony Pictures.

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Inception Takes Crown Over Busy Weekend

The Dark Knight director Christopher Nolan's latest film, Inception, had a stellar opening weekend, taking in $60.4 million over its first three days.  The Leonardo DiCaprio-starring film was buoyed by an aggressive marketing campaign that revealed stunning imagery while holding back relevant plot details.  Audiences were obviously intrigued, and critical response was good, leading to an excellent opening weekend for the big budget movie.  Inception also represents a career-high opening weekend for DiCaprio.

Second place went to last weekend's #1 film, the family-friendly Despicable Me.  Dropping a modest 42%, the film took in $32.7 million, bringing its total so far to $118.3 million after two weeks in release.

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Anything But A 'Despicable' Start

Universal Studios' first foray into 3-D animated feature films got off to a stellar start, with Despicable Me taking in $60.1 million in its opening three days.  The film features voice stars Steve Carrell, Jason Segel and Kristen Wiig and represents a massive opening for a rare non-sequel/remake this summer.

Falling into second place was last weekend's top film, The Twilight Saga: Eclipse, which fell 48.5% to $33.4 million over the weekend.  With total grosses of $237 million so far, the film is currently on track to eclipse the previous film in the series, New Moon which ended up grossing just over $296 million after its release last November.

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Latest Twilight Entry Twinkles to New Heights

The Twlight Saga: Eclipse, the third entry in the tweenage vampire fantasy series, got off to a stellar start since opening last Wednesday.  It took in $82.5 million over the July 4th holiday weekend, adding to the $92.7 million it had already captured in its first two days of release for a cumulative total of $175 million.  Measured against a relatively modest $68 million budget, the film is well on its way to becoming the most profitable film in the series so far for distributor Summit Entertainment.

Second place went to M. Knight Shymalan's latest film, a big screen, live-action adaptation of anime series Avatar: The Last Airbender simply titled "The Last Airbender" to avoid confusion with that "other" Avatar film, with $53 million over the long weekend, leading to a cumulative total of $70.5 million so far.  Given the critical trashing the $150 million-budgeted film took (it has an 8% rating on Rotten Tomatoes), distributor Paramount Pictures is likely more than satisfied with that result.

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Toy Story 3 Takes Crown for Second Time, Grown Ups Settle for Silver

This weekend's box office race was won once again by Disney/Pixar's Toy Story 3.  The newest sequel in the franchise that started Pixar's run of box office hits dropped 46.5% in its second weekend (a modest drop considering the huge opening weekend it had), adding another $59 million to its grosses for a total of $226.5 million in only 10 days.

Second place went to Adam Sandler's ensemble comedy Grown Ups, opening with a very strong $41 million.  Distributor Sony Pictures has a hit on its hands, especially considering the absolutely abysmal word of mouth around the film (as of this writing, its Tomatometer rating is sitting at 9%).

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