Sony's "War Room" leads North American box office

Xinhua

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Sony's faith-based film "War Room" jumped to the first place in its second weekend of release, pushing the three-week champion "Straight Outta Compton" out of the top spot.

"War Room" took 9.35 million U.S. dollars in ticket sales for this weekend, down 18 percent from ticket sales earned in its first weekend of release. The low-budget film produced by Kendrick Brothers cost 3.5 million dollars to make and grossed 24.7 million dollars in ten days of release.

The film tells about a woman who turns her closet into a kind of pray room which she called "war room" to strengthen her spiritual belief in a quest to save her rocky marriage. Benefited from strong word of mouth in the first week, "War Room" was expanded to be shown in 391 more movie theaters to 1,526 locations in total this weekend.

After leading the box office in the past three weekends, Universal's rap music film "Straight Outta Compton" fell to the second place this weekend, with an estimated 8.85 million dollars in tickets revenue this weekend, down 32.6 percent from last weekend. The biopic film, directed by F. Gary Gray about the rise and fall of the Compton, California hip hop group N.W.A. and with a budget of 28 million dollars to make, has grossed 147.8 million dollars in 24 days.

Broad Green Pictures' "A Walk in the Woods" came in the third place with an estimated 8.2 million dollars. "A Walk in the Woods, " starring Oscar winner Robert Redford, received a solid "B" rating from first-night movie goers on CinemaScore. Critics gave it 47 percent in approval rating on RottenTomatoes. It has grossed 10.1 million dollars since its opening Wednesday.

Rounding out the rest 10 most popular movies in the United States and Canada were "Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation" (7.15 million dollars), "The Transporter Refueled" (7.13 million), "No Escape" (5.45 million), "Man From U.N.C.L.E." (3.45 million), "Un Gallo con Muchos Huevos" (3.40 million) and "Sinister 2" (3.38 million), "Inside Out" (3.15 million).