Mike Eschmann's teenage comedy Ready, Steady, Charlie! (Achtung, Fertig, Charlie!) has taken over $731,000 CHF 1m, making it the all-time biggest opener for a Swiss feature film in Switzerland.

The film relegated Pirates Of The Caribbean and American Pie 3 to second and third places in the Swiss box office Top 10.

Opening for Buena Vista International (Switzerland) on 49 prints - unheard of until now for a Swiss production - , the film attracted over 70,000 admissions which translates into over 60% of the German speaking part of the Swiss market and is more than double the opening of last year's local hit Crisis In Havana (Ernstfall In Havanna). Before Ready, Steady, Charlie!, Sabine Buss' comedy Crisis In Havana had held the record as the strongest opener of all time for a Swiss film.

Ready, Steady, Charlie!, a co-production between Lucerne-based Zodiac Pictures International and Berlin-based Sabotage Pictures with backing from broadcasters SF DRS and Teleclub and Impuls Home Entertainment, centres on the hapless Antonio who is led away by military police in the middle of his wedding to start his military training. Willing to do anything to be reunited with his distressed fiancee, he hatches the wild plan to get a female recruit laid as this is sure to have him dismissed from the base. But this gets him into even more trouble.