A bad cop bullied his way to the top of the weekend box office, as a menacing Samuel L. Jackson in Sony Pictures' "Lakeview Terrace" overcame Lionsgate's "My Best Friend's Girl."
Jackson, playing an LAPD officer who harasses a young interracial couple that moves in next door, came in with an estimated $15.6 million across 2,464 screens.
Produced for a modest $20 million by Lionsgate branch Screen Gems and Will Smith's Overbrook Entertainment, the PG-13 thriller is Jackson's second opening this year at No. 1, following February's critically panned "Jumper."
Box office: An article in Business on Monday said the movie "Lakeview Terrace" was produced by Lionsgate branch Screen Gems and was Sony Pictures' second opening this year at No. 1. Screen Gems is a unit of Sony, and the movie was Sony's fifth opening this year in the top spot.
Across the board, ticket sales were down again. Last weekend was the first time box-office grosses went up after seven straight weeks of slipping sales.
"My Best Friend's Girl" had been pegged as the weekend's other major film but was scorched out of second place by the strong second-week performance of the Coen brothers' R-rated "Burn After Reading."
The dark spy comedy from Focus Features, about two gym employees who stumble on the memoir of an ousted CIA official and then try to profit off the find, made an estimated $11.3 million in 2,657 theaters.
The film had a sexy advantage with Brad Pitt and George Clooney in lead roles and generally positive reviews, and its longevity and cumulative $36.4 million draw far exceeded the studio's expectations.
"Word of mouth from the first weekend worked on it, and the country has really fallen in love with this film," said Jack Foley, distribution head for Focus Features. "It just established the momentum further."
Meanwhile, "My Best Friend's Girl" flopped with audiences, who gave it an estimated $8.3-million opening and a scathing 7% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes, extending star Dane Cook's streak of poorly reviewed films.
Mostly young women went to see Cook as a "rebound specialist" who is hired to chase women back to the men they recently dumped, until he falls for his friend's former girlfriend, played by Kate Hudson.
Picking up at No. 4 after a lull in family films, the PG-rated film "Igor," about a mad scientist's hunchbacked assistant and his dreams of winning the annual Evil Science Fair, opened with an estimated $8 million in 2,339 theaters.
The animated comedy is the first film from Exodus Film Group, a tiny Venice-based company with less than a dozen employees, and was made for less than $25 million. MGM co-produced.
"We had always had high hopes for it," said John Eraklis, founder and chief executive of Exodus. "We really did take a risk, and I think people really responded to it. It speaks to people of all ages."
British star Ricky Gervais' dry humor helped "Ghost Town" score a fresh 87% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, and 8th place its debut weekend.
The PG-13 DreamWorks Pictures and Spyglass Entertainment comedy earned an estimated $5.2 million across 1,505 screens with Gervais as a man who can see dead people, one of whom wants to break up the impending marriage of his widow.
tiffany.hsu@latimes.com
