Only "The Happening" (No. 31, $64 million) and "What Happens in Vegas" (No. 22, $80 million) prevented the studio's summer from turning into a record-breaking disaster.

• OVERTURE FILMS: The so-called "boutique" studio tried to "go big" with the Al Pacino-Robert De Niro team-up "Righteous Kill" (No. 51). That film only made ($38 million), and the Don Cheadle spy thriller "Traitor" (No. 76, $23 million) quickly faded from sight.

In-betweens

• DISNEY: "WALL*E" (No. 5, $221 million) was more gold from Pixar. But the second "Chronicles of Narnia" movie, "Prince Caspian" (No. 10) actually underperformed with $141 million.

And "Swing Vote" (No. 86, $16 million) got no vote of confidence from audiences.

• SONY: The awful "Hancock" (No. 4) inexplicably made $227 million. But outside of "Step Brothers" (No. 16, $100 million), the rest of the studio's slate was pretty soft.

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E-mail: jeff@desnews.com