All Is Forbidden

The first on screen pairing of Jet Li and Jackie Chan proved too much for the team behind the comedy Forgetting Sarah Marshall as The Forbidden Kingdom battled its way to the top of box office...



Pamela McClintock of Vsriety:

Jet Li-Jackie Chan fantasy adventure “Forbidden Kingdom” knocked Judd Apatow-branded “Forgetting Sarah Marshall” out of the box office dojo, grossing an estimated $20.9 million from 3,151 runs on the strength of its star billing and PG-13rating.

“Kingdom,” from Lionsgate and the Weinstein Co., unites the two martial arts stars on the bigscreen for the first time. Rob Minkoff directed.

Universal’s R-rated “Sarah Marshall” grossed an estimated $17.3 million as it bowed in 2,798 theaters, according to Rentrak. Heavily marketed raunchy romantic comedy was produced by Apatow.

Perf is a mixed bag for Apatow. “Sarah Marshall” opened better than the last two comedies coming out of the Apatow camp, “Drillbit Taylor” ($10.3 million) and “Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story” ( $4.2 million), but fell short of the openings of “Superbad” ($33 million), “Knocked Up” ($30.7 million) and “The 40-Year-Old Virgin” ($21.4 million).

“Kingdom” received an A- Cinemascore, while “Marshall” got a B.

Combined, “Kingdom” and “Sarah Marshall” were a shot-in-the-arm for the sluggish box office, which has been consistently running behind 2007 levels. Weekend was up 9.1% over the same frame last year.

Sony holdover “Prom Night” came in No. 3 for the weekend, declining 56% in its second sesh to an estimated $9.1 million from 2,700 runs for a cume of $32.6 million in the horror pic’s first 10 days.

Jon Avnet’s Al Pacino starrer “88 Minutes”--the weekend’s other new wide release-came in No. 4, grossing $6.8 million from 2,168 locations. Poorly reviewed film, distributed by Sony domestically, has already played overseas.

Twentieth Century Fox’s family “Nim’s Island” continued to perform well, declining 38% to $5.6 million from 3,277 for a cume of $32.8 million.

Fox Searchlight’s “Street Kings” declined a steep 68% in its second weekend to $4 million from 2,469 for a cume of $19.9 million in its first 10 days.

On the more specialized side, Ben Stein docu “Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed” made the top 10 chart, grossing an estimated $3.1 million from 1,062 runs.

Weinstein Co.’s Morgan Spurlock docu “Where In the World Is Osama Bin Laden” grossed an estimated $143,299 from 102 locations for a per screen average of $1,405...

Joshua Rich of EW:

Jet Li and Jackie Chan's anticipated joint release beat out ''Forgetting Sarah Marshall'' to finish No. 1

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This outcome is a bit of a surprise--Given team Apatow's track record of late--but since we all know the boys usually run the box office--Kingdom is right up their alley--as they get in gear for summer '08.