‘The Dark Knight’ Tops 4th Straight Weekend

There was no miraculous Saturday rise for Pineapple Express as the film was derailed by The Dark Knight. The overall box office plunged to its lowest weekend of the summer, and 2008 has now fallen behind the pace of last year’s record breaking summer.

For the first time since The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King nearly five years ago, a film spent four straight weekends atop the charts. Falling only 39%, The Dark Knight cashed in an estimated $26 million from a still mega-wide 4,025 theaters. In just 24 days, Knight has become the highest grossing film of the decade, topping Shrek 2. With $441.5 million in the till, the Warner Bros. film has become the third highest grosser of all time. Number two on the list is Star Wars, which the Bat should take down in less than a week.

Pineapple Express is starting to run out of stash as the Seth Rogen led feature fell 2% on Saturday and is estimated to make out with $22.4 million from 3,072 theaters over the weekend. Thanks to an impressive $12.1 million Wednesday and $6 million Thursday, the five day start is much stronger at $40.5 million. Still, the film’s high is about to end with Tropic Thunder opening in just three days.

Opening in fourth place with decent results is Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2. The female skewing sequel’s three day weekend of $10.8 million from 2,707 theaters is about the same as its predecessor when inflation adjusted, but the five day total of $19.7 million is considerably higher.

In third place, The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor posted a much steeper second weekend drop than any of its predecessors with a 60% collapse. The threequel added $16.1 million and the total stands at a disappointing $70.7 million after 10 days, but at least the international numbers are strong because of the addition of martial arts star Jet Li to the cast.

Related articles:

• ‘The Dark Knight’ Reclaims Throne on Friday
• ‘Pineapple Express’ $12M Wednesday, ‘Sisterhood’ $5.7M
• ‘Pineapple Express’ to Smoke Up The Box Office
• Can ‘The Dark Knight’ Sink ‘Titanic’?

Box Office Data Source: The Numbers