The cheerleaders of "Bring It On" injected a little team spirit in the second to last weekend of the summer movie season. According to early studio estimates, the film about a team of competitive college cheerleaders led by Kirsten Dunst tumbled for a surprisingly strong $17.4 million this weekend. Paul Dergarabedian, president of Exhibitor Relations Company which tracks box office performance, says the film's PG-13 rating and subject matter seemed to help. "It's back to school time and this movie fits in with that," says Dergarabedian, adding the film had "a great showing for this time of year." "Bring It On" also had the best theatre average in the top 10, earning $7,311 per engagement.

In second place was the debut of action adventure "The Art Of War" starring Wesley Snipes as a covert United Nations troubleshooter. "War" opened to mostly negative reviews and grossed $11.2 million for the weekend.

Last week's number one, "The Cell," dropped 45 percent into third place with $9.6 million. The film about a psychologist who --literally -- enters the mind of a serial killer has earned $33.7 million in two weeks.

The "Space Cowboys" appear to have taken their viagra. The Clint Eastwood adventure about over the hill astronauts dropped only 30 percent to $6.6 million this weekend. So far, the "Cowboys" have orbited $63.8 million in four weeks and appear to be going strong. But not all senior movies are proving popular. "The Crew" was this weekend's only other major film debut. That film stars Richard Dreyfuss and Burt Reynolds as geriatric gangsters looking for another score. But "The Crew's" biggest crime may be its seventh place debut with only $4.1 million this weekend.

Rounding out the top five is last week's number two film "The Original Kings of Comedy." The Spike Lee comedy concert film dropped 45 percent from last weekend to $6.1 million, bringing it's two week total to $21.4 million. "Kings" also had the second best theatre average in the top ten with $6,971 per engagement.

Also in the top 10 this weekend: Sixth place "What Lies Beneath" scared up another $4.5 million for a $130.8 million total; "The Replacements" tied for seventh with $4.1 million; "Nutty Professor II: The Klumps" at number nine ate up another $3.3 million; and "Autumn in New York" sobbed for another $3.2 million in tenth place.

It was a pretty average late August weekend overall. The top 12 films earned an estimated $75.7 million. That's up less than one percent from the same weekend last year and down about 12 percent from last weekend. All in all, the 2000 summer movie season is still down significantly. With only one week left, it looks like Summer 2000 will be about $200 million short compared to last year, according to Dergarabedian.

Reprinted from Zap2it - August 27th, 2000