Clooney's 'American' top weekend film
<p>George Clooney is shown in a scene from "The American," which made $16.4 million over the Labor Day weekend.</p>
LOS ANGELES (AP) - George Clooney's hitman tale "The American" has captured the top spot at the box office with a $16.4 million debut over the long Labor Day weekend.
Since opening Wednesday, the Focus Features release has taken in $19.5 million.
The 20th Century Fox revenge romp "Machete" and Sony's heist thriller "Takers" were in a duel for second-place.
"Machete" led with $14 million from Friday to Monday. "Takers" followed with $13.5 million, though the two movies were close enough that rankings could change once final numbers are released today.
"Takers," which had been the No. 1 movie the previous weekend, raised its 10-day total to $40 million.
The weekend's other new wide release, Drew Barrymore's romance "Going the Distance" from Warner Bros., opened at No. 5 with $8.6 million.
It was a typically quiet Labor Day period for Hollywood, a transition weekend as summer blockbuster season ends and young audiences prepare for the start of the school year.
Hollywood closed its busiest season with record revenue of $4.35 billion, about $100 million more than the previous high set last summer, according to Hollywood.com, which tracks box office. Yet because of higher ticket prices, movie attendance slipped to about 552 million, the lowest since summer 2005, said Hollywood.com analyst Paul Dergarabedian.
"This is a perfectly unspectacular end to a perfectly unspectacular summer," Dergarabedian said. "If you look at how low the attendance figure dropped, that's the audience telling Hollywood this crop of movies was good, but not good enough to get us out in huge numbers."
"The American" stars Clooney as a hitman who finds unlikely friendship and romance while trying to lay low in Italy before doing one last job.