Knight's End

After 4 weeks on top...The box office reign of The Dark Knight is over...

Tropic Thunder rumbled past the competition....while the Star Wars saga lost....twice.



Pamela McClintock of Variety:

DreamWorks and Paramount's big-budget comedy "Tropic Thunder" topped the weekend box office in grossing an estimated $26 million from 3,319 theaters for a five-day opening cume of $37 million.

The R-rated comedy skewed older, with a hefty 57% of the aud over the age of 25.

Warner Bros.' Batman sequel "The Dark Knight" also was victorious in officially becoming the second highest grossing pic of all time domestically, surpassing the original "Star Wars." For the weekend, "Dark Knight" grossed an estimated $16.8 million from 3,590 runs for a cume of $471.5 million in just 30 days.

Warner Bros. took the No. 2 spot with "Dark Knight and the No. 3 spot with George Lucas' animated "Star Wars: The Clone Wars," which opened to an estimated $15.5 million from 3,452 runs.

Among other new openings, New Regency's R-rated "Mirrors," distributed by 20th Century Fox, took advantage of being the only horror pic in the market, coming in No. 4 and debuting an estimated $11.1 million from 2,664 runs.

Woody Allen pic "Vicky Cristinia Barcelona," bowing on 692 screens and released by MGM/The Weinstein Co., placed No. 10 for the weekend in grossing an estimated $3.7 million for a per screen average of $5,361. Like Allen's other pics, film played strongest on the East Coast.

Summit's 3-D toon "Fly Me to the Moon" wasn't able to crack the top 10 in its bow, hampered by holdover 3-D film "Journey to the Center of the Earth." "Fly Me to the Moon" opened to an estimated $2 million from 452 screens, coming in behind "Journey," which grossed an estimated $3.5 million from 1,405 screens for a cume of $88.1 million in its sixth sesh.

"Tropic Thunder"--toplining Ben Stiller, Robert Downey Jr., Jack Black and Tom Cruise--seemed to take a bite out of Sony's R-rated "Pineapple Express," which fell a steep 57% in its second weekend to an estimated $3,255 from 3,072 playdates for a cume of $62.9 million in its first 10 days...

Nicole Sperling of EW:

Ben Stiller ends four weeks of box-office gold for 'Dark Knight'; Batman film now has No. 2 gross of all time

I suppose it's fitting that TDK was knocked down by a movie starring the guy who plays comic book rival Iron Man...

Still passing the first Star Wars aint too bad all while coming in second place...