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The Rite flies high at box office

New York - The Anthony Hopkins horror film The Rite topped the box office on a weekend notable for the bump many Oscar-nominated films received, according to studio estimates on Sunday.

The Warner Bros film earned $15m from just under 3 000 theaters. The Exorcist-influenced movie drew most of its audience from the older-than-25 demographic.

In its 10th week of release, the Weinstein Company's The King's Speech earned $11.1m while adding nearly 900 screens.

Now with a cumulative box-office haul of $72.2m, the story of King George VI's triumph over his stuttering affliction continues to build momentum as the Oscar favourite for best picture. It led with 12 Oscar nominations on Tuesday, and its director, Tom Hooper, won best director from the Directors Guild on Saturday.

Last week's top film, the Natalie Portman romantic comedy No Strings Attached, from Paramount, slipped to second with $13.7m.

The other debut this weekend, CBS Films' action film The Mechanic, which stars Jason Statham and Ben Foster, took in $11.5m, tied for third with Sony's updated superhero film The Green Hornet.

Rising tide of The King's Speech

Heavily marketed, The Rite sought a PG-13 rating less to attract younger audience members than "not to offend" older fans of the 73-year-old Hopkins, said Dan Fellman, head of distribution for Warner Bros.

Fellman credited the film's success to Hopkins, who remains a draw for moviegoers, especially in scary films that recall his famous performance as Hannibal Lecter in 1991's The Silence of the Lambs and its sequels.

The King's Speech saw the biggest increase after Oscar nominations were announced on Tuesday, jumping 41 percent from its performance last weekend.

The Coen brothers' Western True Grit was up four percent in its sixth week, bringing its total to $138m. The Fighter, in its eighth week, and Portman's Black Swan, in its ninth week, had only slight drop-offs from the prior weekend.

Still, it was hard to ignore the rising tide of The King's Speech, which has usurped David Fincher's The Social Network as prognosticators' pick to win best picture at the Academy Awards on February 27. Its star, Colin Firth, is believed to be a lock for best actor.

"If I was in Vegas, I'd slip a few bucks on it," said Fellman of The King's Speech. (Warner Bros’ dog in the fight is Christopher Nolan's Inception, whose chances for best picture are considered slim.)

Down-weekends at Box Office

The Screen Actors Guild, whose members make up a large block of academy voters, was to hand out their awards on Sunday.

"The Oscar bump is in full effect," said Hollywood.com analyst Paul Dergarabedian.

But the box-office opportunity for Academy Awards favourites is there partially because of the lack of blockbuster dominance in the marketplace. The weekend was Hollywood's 12th down-weekend in a row, meaning total box office was below that of the corresponding weekend a year earlier.

Last year's high January totals were largely due to the enormous success of James Cameron's 3D epic Avatar, which went on to become the highest grossing film ever.

"Avatar is casting a long shadow, making our comparisons week after week very tough," said Dergarabedian. "It's an anomaly. The marketplace is kind of doing what it's supposed to be doing."

Dergarabedian saw the streak of down-weekends likely to continue, possibly passing the 2005 record of 18 consecutive down-weekends.

The estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at US and Canadian theaters, according to Hollywood.com, final figures will be released on Monday.

1. The Rite, $15m.

2. No Strings Attached, $13.7m.

3. The Green Hornet, $11.5m.

4. The Mechanic, $11.5m.

5. The King's Speech, $11.1m.

6. True Grit, $7.6m.

7. The Dilemma, $5.5m.

8. Black Swan, $5.1m.

9. The Fighter, $4.1m.

10. Yogi Bear, $3.2m.

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