WALL POST

July 27, 2009 02:35:42 GMT
As the ticket sales of 'Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince' plummets, 'G-Force' works its own magic and wins the top slot over the three-day weekend at the box office.

Walt Disney Pictures' live action and computer-generated animation family feature, "G-Force", has made a surprising debut at the North American box office. Pulling in an estimated $32.2 million over the three-day weekend, the Jerry Bruckheimer-produced movie took over the #1 position from last week champion, "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince".

According to Paul Dergarabedian of Hollywood.com, the strong run of "G-Force" has benefited from a "great marketing campaign and a premise that had people scratching their heads while simultaneously grabbing the family." He further claimed, "This summer is all about packaging and escapism. People were scratching their heads and dragging their kids to go see this thing."

"They were watching the trailers with absolute shock going, 'Is that really happening?' But as a kid you're like, 'I gotta go see it,' " Dergarabedian added. "This is a testament to the fact that Jerry Bruckheimer, like ('Transformers' director) Michael Bay, knows exactly what summer movie audiences want."

More than half of the box office bow the movie featuring talking guinea pigs as action heroes took came from its 3-D screening. The number was a slightly greater 3-D share than "Up" and "Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs" had in their debuts. Overseas, the film which characters are voiced by Nicolas Cage and Penelope Cruz among others landed third after four days screening at 37 international locations.

Hot on "G-Force" tail was the sixth "Harry Potter" movie. Despite its 61.5% drop in its second week, the Daniel Radcliffe-starring adventure fantasy movie collected approximately two millions less than the Disney's feature with $30 million in its pocket. Although it didn't manage to hold on its #1 spot in North America, "Half-Blood Prince" was still dominant on the foreign circuit. It lured $84.4 million from more than 16,000 screens in 64 territories.

Third place went to newcomer "The Ugly Truth". The Katherine Heigl and Gerard Butler-starring movie raked in around $27 million over the weekend. Meanwhile, another newcomer "Orphan" also did well in its opening week, nabbing the fourth place with an estimated $12.8 million. Rounding up top five was "Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs" with $8.2 million to add to the total of around $171.3 million.