1. Looper (449 sites) W/E: £2,427,994 NEW

2. ParaNorman (495) W/E: £1,080,197 Total: £4,304,900

3. Resident Evil: Retribution (349) W/E: £792,265 NEW

4. The Campaign (390) W/E: £772,102 NEW

5. House at the End of Street (369) W/E: £545,961 Total: £1,864,304

6. Killing Them Softly (372) W/E: £470,712 Total: £2,069,984

7. Hope Springs (381) W/E: £423,051 Total: £3,041,790

8. The Sweeney (342) W/E: £410,578 Total: £3,876,142

9. Brave (466) W/E: £400,511 Total: £21,219,445

10. Untouchable (153) W/E: £317,979 Total: £493,309

Source: The Guardian

Taking advantage of some stellar marketing and almost uniformly strong reviews coming from both online press and more traditional print outlets, Rian Johnson’s Looper opens with a rather muscular £2.4 million which given what the film actually is, a rather intimate character study dressed in blockbuster clothing, is a fantastic result and with sure to be very strong word-of-mouth over the next few weeks, Looper will be looking to take up residency in the chart for a while now. While its doubtful the film will retain this spot next weekend, its lifetime total should be a very healthy amount for E-One, a distributor who have really come into their own over the last few years.

Managing to hold up well with another week with over £1 million banked again is Universal’s ParaNorman which is taking full advantage of being the
only even relatively fresh kids offering out there at the moment, and will be for a couple more weeks yet as this week’s new offerings don’t look to be aiming for the younger crowds at all (though Taken 2′s controversial 12A rating certainly looks to maybe speak to some of the older kids in this demographic).

The big disappointment, at least financially, for the week would be Sony’s Resident Evil: Retribution which with the competition offered by Looper’s reputation of actually being a good film seems to have somewhat drowned the opening takings for this film with the franchises’ lowest opening ever. How well this holds is slightly in question as it may well be that some who wanted to see this saw Looper instead and so maycome out this coming weekend but again, with the aforementioned Taken 2 out this Thursday, the film has even more direct competition for its audience and so could turn into a major damp squib for Sony.

Yet another new entry follows on as Warner’s The Campaign opens with a rather muted box office though frankly this was always going to be a tougher sell than most Will Ferrell starring comedies due to its political plotting and while the film has had a funny trailer, the marketing for the UK market does feel like somewhat of an afterthough for the distributor and this result is not all that much of a surprise, and especially given just how bloody busy the releases have been lately.

The rest of the chart sees a fair amount of holdovers as House at the End of the Street holds up surprisingly well given the hugely negative reviews around, though with it entering October and with little out for the horror crowd, maybe Momentum’s release date choice was smart overall. Dropping over 5-% week-on-week is Killing Them Softly which had a fair amount of competition but maybe would have been expected to hold better. Hope Springs appears to have popped a little blue pill with a drop of less than a third week-on-week on the back of an impressive hold last week. The Sweeney drops less than 50% but appears to be saying goodbye to the chart, Brave continues to offer options for kids who may be a little too scared for ParaNorman and in an expansion in its second week, Untouchable graces the chart for likely the first and only time, though this release pattern seems to have worked for Entertainment.

In yet another crowded weekend for new releases, I’m expecting Fox’s Taken 2 to open with a splash before diving off a cliff the following week, with the 12A rating opening meaning a far wider potential audience can see the film after the 15-rated theatrical cut of the original from a few years ago. Looking to squeeze through the gaps is E-One’s The Perks of Being a Wallflower which has the Emma Watson factor in its favour, along with solid enough reviews which should see the film hit its teen demographic effectively enough. Revolver aim for slightly older teens and adults with campus dramedy Liberal Arts which opens in a bit of a limited release and finally The Works release the apparent poop-fest which is The Knot which may do something with the date crowd.