Yet again The Avengers ruled the box office, and boy did the rest of the top five stink up the place.

The Avengers added another $55 million to its box office haul in the U.S. and it is now Disney’s highest earning film in history both here and worldwide.  The domestic total stands at $457 million and $1.18 billion worldwide.  While I think everyone thought this movie would do well, I really don’t think anyone could have predicted this outcome.

Coming in an embarrassing second place was Battleship with $25.3 million.  This is shaping up to be the new John Carter: $200 million+ budget, dismal opening weekend, decent overseas numbers.  This has “shipwreck” written all over it.  (Course, I’ve been saying that since this project was announced …)

Third place went to The Dictator with $17.4 million, well below expectations.  Can’t say as I’m surprised by this one either.

Dark Shadows fell to fourth place from number two last weekend with a 57% slide to $12.7 million.

What to Expect When You’re Expecting opened in fifth place with $10.5 million, also well below projections.

In short, this weekend was a disaster for any film not about a team of superheroes.

Next week sees the Chernobyl Diaries open pretty wide alongside Men in Black 3.  I’m calling it now, though, MiB is going to open soft.  It may very well beat The Avengers, but it will only be due to the age of the film by then.  The advance buzz is weak at best, so I’m not expecting a lot out of it.

Even in its second weekend, The Avengers continues to dominate the records.

Following its $207.3 million first weekend, pundits began to wonder what The Avengers could do in its second weekend.  No film had ever done more than 75 million in a second outing, and no comic book film has ever lost as little as 50%.  Well, this one did both.  Falling 50.3%, the film brought in another $103 million, bringing its domestic total to $373.1 million in just 10 days.  Combined with it’s foreign box office results, it is has pushed past the $1 billion benchmark in just 19 days.  It now looks set to breeze past $500 million domestic.

Coming in a very distant second was Tim Burton’s Dark Shadows with an anemic $28.8 million.  Combined with a traditionally soft weekend and The Avengers to deal with, this film had next to no chance, even with Johnny Depp in the lead role.

Third place went to Think Like a Man with another $6.3 million to add to its tally.  With a $12 million dollar budget and $81 million at the box office already, this film is making some executives very happy.

The Hunger Games continues to hold on with another $4.4 million which was enough to secure it a fourth place finish.

Rounding out the top five was The Lucky One with another $4 million.

Wednesday will see Sascha Baron Cohen’s The Dictator opening wide, and Friday will see What to Expect When You’re Expecting and Battleship will take their respective bows nationwide. As The Avengers has already over performed by leaps and bounds, some analysts are already calling next weekend a threepeat with the numbers for all of the movies opening being adjusted downwards for their opening tallies.  We’ll have to wait and see what happens, but I can’t say I disagree with those assessments.

The reign of The Hunger Games has come to a close, but don’t expect the new champion to stay on the top for long.

After four weeks at the top, The Hunger Games has fallen from the top spot and been replaced by Think Like a Man.  It brought in an impressive $33 million off of a $12 million budget.  In short, it’s in profit, and seeing as I’ve seen like one commercial for it, it isn’t off of being a marketing machine.

Also surprising this weekend was The Lucky One, so apparently folks were ready for some romance at the theater as opposed to kids trying to kill one another.  It landed in second with $22.8 million.

The Hunger Games fell to third place with another $14.5 million for a cumulative $356.9 million domestically.

Possibly the biggest surprise of the weekend was the Disney documentary Chimpanzee. With only 1,563 screens to its name, the film still managed to come in fourth with $10.2 million.

Coming in fifth was The Three Stooges with $9.2 million, which doesn’t sound that impressive, but it was only a slip of 45.9%.

From the land of oddities, Battleship, which doesn’t open here until next month, is doing pretty well for itself in the foreign markets.  In only its second weekend the film is up to a cumulative $129.6 million.  If this is any indication for the domestic release, this film is going to do better than many expected.

Next week’s big releases are The Five-Year Engagement, The Pirates! Band of Misfits, The Raven and Safe.

It’s four weekends at the top for The Hunger Games.

Despite the numbers falling as movies do, The Hunger Games is staying in the top spot again.  The film brought in another $21.5 million this weekend bringing its domestic total to $337 million.

Second place went to the new version of The Three Stooges which broung in a respectable $17.1 million.  The reviews haven’t been the best, however, so it’s somewhat doubtful that this movie will have any staying power.

The Cabin in the Woods opened to $14.85 million which seems a little weak as it has been a little while since a horror film hit the theaters, but we’ll see how it does in the coming weeks. It’s unlikely it will hold up.

Titanic 3D slipped 32.7% to land in fourth place with $11.62 million.  That’s a very decent hold, but apparently people weren’t that anxious to see the film in 3D.

American Reunion took a 50.3% hit, which is fine, but when you didn’t start out that strong, it’s not good. The film fell from second to fifth this week with $10.7 million.

Nothing seems to be really growing any legs as of late outside of The Hunger Games, and the only big release next week is the new Zac Efron romance The Lucky One.  It might be able to knock out the current champ, but we’ll just have to wait and see.

John Carter?  Landed in 18th place with $346,000 bringing its domestic total to $68.7 million.  Foreign is up to $200.6 million, and off of a $250 million budget, this has turned into pretty much a total disaster for Disney.

On a side note, Battleship, which opens domestically on May 18, has already opened in the foreign markets and is actually doing well.  It’s hit $58 million so far, but no word on its final budget.

I’m a fairly verbose person. It isn’t often that something I see or read leaves my jaw literally hanging, but this new trailer for the upcoming Battleship movie comes pretty close.

Reportedly based on the board game of the same name, Battleship is the first film of several proposed projects based on famous Hasbro properties.  Once you finish watching this, I dare anyone to tell me how this reminds you even the slightest bit of that famous game.  At any time while playing it did you think, “You know, I bet this has something to do with aliens …”

I’ve known the basic plot of this film for some time now, but seeing more of it realized just makes me realize how insanely idiotic this whole thing is.  How did any one sign on to this project with even a modicum of self-respect left in their body?

Take a gander … and then immediately head to shower to wash the filth off of yourself.

Circulating since 2009 as a project, the film version of the famous board game Battleship is becoming a real deal, and the first trailer has now been released. Yes, it looks as pointless as you’d imagine.

It would appear that director Peter Berg has gone to the Michael Bay School of Directing for his latest cinematic outing.  While we can imagine it was difficult for anyone to come up with a concept for a game that is based solely around saying things like “B6″ and “Miss,” we’re not quite sure going for slow motion, lingering shots of water droplets falling from an alien ship passing over an inflatable boat was the way to go. Oh yeah, did I mention that it involves aliens? Because that was the most logical way to set up this story.

From watching the painful trailer, it would appear the aliens erect a dome over the battlefield, and the U.S. Naval ships lose their radar, which is what I’m betting will lead to them coming up with a grid system to call where they should be aiming their shots … you know … like “A4.”  Let me just begin pounding my head into a keyboard now despite the fact the film doesn’t release until next summer.

My biggest question is how Liam Nesson got sucked into this project.  Was he this hard up for a paycheck?

Watch the Battleship trailer at your own risk … you may feel cranial bleeding.