UK Box Office Information 4th-6th July 08

So far this year we have seen superheros in the shape of Iron Man and The Incredible Hulk but never have we seen a superhero quite like Hancock (Sony). Nonetheless, this drunken superhero (played by Mr Will 'the most bankable man in Hollywood' Smith) who has a PR make over from Jason Bateman has crash landed into first place on its opening weekend with £9.6m including preview. Having the 2nd highest opening of the year to date, Hancock will undoubtedly go on to be one of summer's biggest hits.

Everybody is kung-fu fighting for Kung-Fu Panda (Paramount) which high-kicked its way into 2nd place this weekend, taking £6.1m including previews. Jack Black provides the voice for a slightly podgy panda named Po who has to master the ancient art of kung-fu to protect his valley from a slightly evil snow leopard. Angelina Jolie, Dustin Hoffman and Jackie Chan also provide voices for the other martial-arts inclined characters. Judo-chop!

Frank Darabont is best know for directing The Shawshank Redemption but he has taken another of Stephen King's stories with The Mist (Momentum) which opened in 8th place with £157k. Following a violent thunderstorm, a small town come under threat from mysterious creatures who prowl around in the mist. Luckily there are holed up in a supermarket, so at least they won't get hungry - that's not to say that the creatures won't though!!

Opening in 12th place is the Bollywood film Love Story 2050 (Adlabs), which opened with £49k. Set in the future, this is a rare sci-fi movie for the Bollywood genre and is said to be India's biggest and most expensive sci-fi movie to date.

The last new entry is The Visitor (Halycon) which opened in 13th place with £49k and tells the story of a professor who befriends a young immigrant couple squatting in his apartment.


Interesting Film Fact of the week:

The script for Hancock originally came to light in 1996 under the title Tonight, He Comes and has had names such as Tony Scott and Michael Mann attached to the project before Peter Berg took over at the helm.


Exciting film news of the week:

This year has certainly been the year for remakes and remodels of old 80s classics and it has now been announced that the Cold War action flick Red Dawn is to be remade. The original 1984 film starred Patrick Swayze, Charlie Sheen and Jennifer Grey as high-school kids defending their small town from Soviet invasion, but the new director - Dan Bradley - intends to update the flick to make it reflect our post 9/11 world.


Source: Carlton Screen Advertising


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