CHINA BOX OFFICE: Undeterred by piracy, The Expendables 3 grossed $32.84 in its first week at the China box office, knocking Dawn Of The Planet Of The Apes into second position.

The Expendables 3

Opening on September 1, Lionsgate and Millennium’s aging action hero sequel drew 6.3 million admissions during its first seven days. Beijing-based Le Vision Pictures backed the movie and worked on its local marketing with official importer China Film Group.

Meanwhile, Dawn Of The Planet Of The Apes grossed $27.02m and pulled in 4.5 million admissions over the same time frame (Sep 1-7). Fox’s Apes sequel has now grossed a muscular $74.33m after ten days on release.

But Always, a New York-set romantic drama, came in third with $7.05m from 1.4 million admissions. Starring Nicholas Tse and Gao Yuanyuan, the film was co-produced by Hong Kong’s Emperor Motion Pictures and China’s Wanda Media and Dadi Media.

The top three films took the lion’s share of a relatively slow week at the box office over the Mid-Autumn Festival holiday. DreamWorks’ How To Train Your Dragon 2 grossed just $800,000 for fourth place in the chart. The animation sequel has grossed $64.27m after four weeks on release.

Gordon Chan’s The Four 3 came in fifth, with $670,000 for a cumulative gross of $31.04m, followed by romantic comedy Temporary Family with $460,000 and a cume of $16.28m.

Three weekend openers came next: Tale Of The Rally with $430,000, Delhi Safari with $340,000 and Metegol with $310,000. Rounding out the chart was local horror Under The Bed 2 which took $160,000 for a cume of $2.30m.