There’s been little cheer at the US box office, due to what was easily the lowest grossing weekend of 2012 so far. The problem was that the holdovers weren’t that strong, while the new entries barely made a dent. The Expendables 2 stayed top of the list with $13.5 million, a 53% drop on its first weekend takings, so that it’s now noticeably trailing the take of the first film in the franchise.
The top new entry could only place seventh on the list, with the Joseph Gordon Levitt action flick Premium Rush taking just $6.3 million. It’s a very weak start and some are blaming a rather lacklustre marketing campaign, as the film has had pretty good reviews and many believe that with the right push it could have done a lot better.
After expanding onto 1,091 screens, the documentary 2016 Obama’s America made its first appearance in the top 10 in eighth place, taking $6.2 million. It’s now the highest grossing documentary of the year and the highest ever for a political doc that takes a conservative viewpoint – in case you were wondering, the film doesn’t think America will be in a good place in 2016 if Obama gets elected for a second term.
The only other new entry in the top 10 is the Dax Shepard, Kristen Bell and Bradley Cooper comedy Hit & Run, which took a lowly $4.6 million. The only redeeming factor for that is that it’s believed it only cost a couple of million to make. And while horror is normally seen as a fairly sure thing at the box office, The Apparition couldn’t even make it into a very weak top 10, placing 12th with a lowly $2.9 million.
Take a look below for the US box office top 10 for the weekend of August 24th-26th.
| Rank | Title | Weekend Gross (millions) | Total Gross to date (millions) |
| 1 | The Expendables 2 | $13.5 | $52.3 |
| 2 | The Bourne Legacy | $9.3 | $85.5 |
| 3 | Paranorman | $8.5 | $28.2 |
| 4 | The Campaign | $7.4 | $64.5 |
| 5 | The Dark Knight Rises | $7.1 | $422.1 |
| 6 | The Odd Life Of Timothy Green | $7.1 | $27.0 |
| 7 | Premium Rush | $6.3 | $6.3 |
| 8 | 2016 Obama’s American | $6.2 | $9.0 |
| 9 | Hope Springs | $6.0 | $45.0 |
| 10 | Hit And Run | $4.6 | $5.8 |