Funny People Tops US Box Office

Judd Apatow's latest movie, Funny People, has topped the US box office with a relatively modest take of $23.4 million, which is towards the low end of analyst's expectations. It was a weak lead for a weak weekend at cinemas, with the overall box office dropping 25% from the same weekend a year ago.

The only other opener to hit the top 10 was the family movie Aliens in the Attic, which only managed to make if to fifth place with a disappointing $7.8m. It means that neither of the week's big openers are likely to live up to expectations, with both needing strong first weekends and positive word of mouth if they hoped to keep momentum at the US box office.

Harry Potter And The Half Blood Prince took second place, to reach $255 million, which allowed it to overtake the US take of the previous lowest grossing Harry Potter movie, Harry Potter And The Prisoner Of The Azkaban, which took a total of $249 million in 2004. By next weekend it should also have overtaken Harry Potter And The Chamber Of Secrets' $261m total. Harry Potter 6 is still at the top of the overall non-US box office though, making $42.7m in international territories to take its non-US gross to a stirling $492.3 million in only three weeks.

Also significant in the international chart is that Ice Age 3 has now taken $550 million outside the US, giving it the highest international take ever for an animated movie, moving past Finding Nemo's previous record of $525 million. The film has no doubt been helped massively by its 3D release and the fact that there's been little 3D competition over the past few weeks.

Take a look below for the full US top 10 for the weekend July 31st-August 2nd.