Tyro director Quentin Tarantino scored his biggest opening ever with Inglourious Basterds, which earned an estimated $37.6 million, while the sleeper hit, District 9, which appeals to the same older male demographic, fell only 49% in its second frame. With Basterds strong debut and the fact that none of the holdovers in the top ten declined by more than 50%, the box office surged some 26% ahead of the same weekend last year. After a weak July,
Weekend Box Office (Studio Estimates): August 21-23
| Rank | Film | Weekend Gross | Screens | Avg./Screen |
| 1 | Inglourious Basterds | $37,602,000 | 3,165 | $11,881 |
| 2 | District 9 | $18,900,000 | 3,050 | $6,197 |
| 3 | G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra | $12,500,000 | 3,953 | $3,162 |
| 4 | The Time Traveler's Wife | $10,025,000 | 2,988 | $3,355 |
| 5 | Julie & Julia | $9,000,000 | 2,463 | $3,654 |
| 6 | Shorts | $6,600,000 | 3,105 | $2,126 |
| 7 | G-Force | $4,205,000 | 2,561 | $1,642 |
| 8 | Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince | $3,515,000 | 1,936 | $1,816 |
| 9 | The Ugly Truth | $2,850,000 | 1,971 | $1,446 |
| 10 | Post Grad | $2,800,000 | 1,959 | $1,429 |
Inglourious Basterds, which reportedly cost some $70 million to produce, is a crucial film for the survival of the independent Weinstein Company, which has already announced plans to turn the World War II revenge fantasy into a franchise with both a prequel and a sequel. The audience for Basterds was 58% male, with 70% of the male audience over 25.
Like the wicked smart science fiction film District 9,
Movies that appeal to female viewers demonstrated some staying power as well. Warner Bros.’ The Time Traveler’s Wife dropped a modest 46% in its second weekend and narrowly beat out Sony’s Julie and Julia, which fell just 26% in its third frame and has already earned nearly $60 million.
While Basterds took the box office by storm, three other new films were pretty much DOA. Robert Rodriguez’s kidcentric Shorts fared the best out of the unlucky trio, earning some $6 million and finishing in 6th place. But its debut was a far cry from that of Rodriguez’s Spy Kids, which earned $26.5 million in 2001. Fox’s Post Grad debuted in 10th place and earned just $2.8 million from nearly 2000 theaters, but X Games 3D: The Movie, Disney’s attempt to lure a young audience with a combination of 3D and over-hyped “extreme sports” TV fare, fared the worst, managing only a pathetic $572 per theater average from 1,399 venues, proving that 3D alone is not enough to insure success.
Hayao Miyazaki’s Ponyo declined only 32.3% in its second frame as it pushed its earnings to over $8 million. While Ponyo slipped out of the top ten to number twelve, it is on track to top Spirited Away’s $10 million take and become the anime maestro’s biggest hit in
2009’s biggest hit so far, Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, earned less than a million dollars in its ninth week of release, but it nevertheless brought its cumulative to $398.4 million, while Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince remained in the top ten during its sixth frame by bringing in $3.5 million and running its domestic total to $290 million.
