BBC News Online: Entertainment: Film

Apes swing in to number one

Planet Of The Apes is directed by Tim Burton

The science fiction adventure, starring Mark Wahlberg, Tim Roth and Helena Bonham Carter, earned more than £5m in its first three days as it opened in 446 cinemas across the UK.

The tale of animals fighting a high-tech espionage war earned £1.7m over the weekend.

Rush Hour 2 and Jurassic Park III both dropped one place to third and fourth respectively.

Rush Hour 2, starring Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker, is the follow-up to the duo's first Rush Hour cop comedy and earned £979,000 over the weekend.

Jurassic Park III follows in the footsteps of its two hit predecessors by focusing once more on a group of humans being chased around a remote island by pre-historic monsters.

This time the film is directed by Joe Johnston rather than Steven Spielberg.

Jurassic Park III grossed £616,000.

Shrek, the animated tale of a green ogre and a beautiful princess, is at number five, grossing £604,000.

Comedian Steve Coogan's first major film, The Parole Officer, has slipped back from five to six, earning £508,000.

Coogan - best-known as small screen chat show host Alan Partridge - plays a failed parole officer who tries to clear his name after being implicated in a murder.

The Parole Officer is Coogan's first attempt to make the transition from TV comedian to film funnyman.

Despite his popularity as a comic, the film's critical reception has been lukewarm.

In the lower reaches of the charts are two Bollywood films, Yeh Raaste Hein Pyar Ke and Dil Chanta Hai at positions 11 and 12 respectively.

The films have achieved chart positions despite being shown at only a small number of outlets - just 16, in the case of Dil Chanta Hai.