Rob Cohen's action drama The Fast And The Furious roared into the UK at the weekend taking a three-day gross of $2.6m (£1.76m). However the film, which centres on the Los Angeles street-racing scene, was not able to dethrone last weekend's opener Moulin Rouge from its number one spot. Furious played at 414 sites for an impressive average of $6,253. It stars Pitch Black's Vin Diesel and Paul Walker, last seen in Cohen previous effort The Skulls.

20th Century Fox's Moulin Rouge clearly supplied the escapism audiences were in desperate need of this weekend after the events of last week. The musical dropped off just 15% from its opening three-day take to pull in a further $2.7m (£1.86m) from 314 sites, a massive $8,697 average. Baz Luhrmann's spectacular romp, which stars Nicole Kidman and Ewan McGregor, has already built up a resounding $8.3m (£5.7m) in its first 10-days.

The only other new release to make the chart over the weekend was Icon Film Distribution's The Martins. The UK production recorded takings of $456,094 (£310,600) to take seventh place. Showing at just 163 sites the comedy managed a site average of $2,798. Another Icon release, Heartbreakers, is also still in the chart, in ninth position and has grossed $4.4m to date.

Starring comedian Lee Evans and Kathy Burke, The Martins was just one of four UK films to open in their home territory at the weekend. The remaining three were Greenfingers, starring Croupier's Clive Owen, ($42,424 from 81 sites); Shiner, featuring Michael Caine ($15,214 from seven); and Pandaemonium ($11,962 from seven).

The top five were rounded out by Columbia TriStar's A Knight's Tale, immovable in third place with $1.03m; Scary Movie 2, from BVI, dropping 60% in its second weekend to take $907,762; and another Fox release Planet Of The Apes at five ($650,963).