There were only five new releases to chart this week, but three of them occupied the top three spots. That included 10,000 B.C., which opened with 892,000 units sold and $15.54 million in revenue. The Spiderwick Chronicles was reasonably close behind in second place with 745,000 units during its first week of release for sales of $12.93 million. Like it did theatrically, Definitely, Maybe struggled on the home market with 242,000 units / $4.37 million in sales. Fool's Gold fell from first to fourth with 223,000 units / $3.62 million over the weekend for totals of 818,000 units and $14.27 million after two. The only other holdover in the top five was The Bucket List, which added 153,000 units for a running tally of 1.62 million units and $26.65 million in spending.

The best of the rest of the new releases was Futurama - The Beast with a Billion Backs which placed ninth with 126,000 units for sales of $2.52 million. The final new release to chart was In Bruges, which opened in 17th place with $966,000 in revenue from 48,000 units sold.

One more note, while National Treasure: Book of Secrets fell out of the top five for the week, it climbed into second place for the year. Additionally, it is still ahead of I Am Legend's pace, and could become the number one selling DVD of the year so far.

Blu-ray saw modest growth this week up 5% to $8.9 million, however, DVD sales were also up and as a percent of total sales Blu-ray fell to 6%. I doubt things will improve significantly next week, but they should when Batman Begins makes its Blu-ray debut.

- C.S.Strowbridge

Date posted: 2008-07-08