In the battle of horror franchises, ‘The Final Destination’ scared off ‘Halloween II’ to claim top honors at the weekend US box office.
‘The Final Destination’, boosted by higher ticket prices for its 3-D screenings, sold $28.3 million worth of tickets during its first three days, setting a record for the series.
The latest ‘Halloween’ outing of masked serial killer Michael Myers opened at number 3 with $17.4 million, compared to the $26 million bow of the previous entry.
In between was last weekend's champion, ‘Inglourious Basterds," with $20 million. After 10 days, Quentin Tarantino's violent World War II movie has earned $73.7 million. Its early international total stands at $59.1 million after a $19.4 million weekend from 31 territories.
With yet another horror film, ‘District 9,’ claiming the fourth spot with $10.7 million in its third weekend, cinemas were no place for the squeamish or intellectually curious.
Or for nostalgic hippies: Taiwanese director Ang Lee's ‘Taking Woodstock’ a comedy set against the 1969 music festival, opened in ninth place with just $3.7 million for the weekend.
The biggest movie of the summer - and the year so far – in the US, was ‘Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen’ with $399.4 million, while ‘Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince’ was a distant second with $294.4 million.
