The Inbetweeners Movie makes it four in a row in the UK

Entertainment Film Distributors comedy The Inbetweeners Movie continued its astonishing run in the UK, taking a further £2.1m  -a week-on-week drop of only 42% in its fourth week - for a cumulative of £39.4m.

The film is still playing on a week-high 475 screens and scored a week-best average of £4,521, becoming only the second film to go four consecutive weeks at number one in 2011.

The Inbetweeners Movie continues to gross well despite the end of the school holidays and is now only £5m off the box office record for an independent UK film set earlier this year by The King’s Speech. The film ranks 32nd on the UK all time chart, last week surpassing Shrek The Third and The Simpsons Movie.

Sony comedy Friends With Benefits opened in second place, grossing a so-so £1.9m (including £431,185 from 380 previews) from 432 screens at an average of £4,508. Starring Mila Cunis and Justin Timberlake, Friends With Benefits took double the February opening of Ivan Reitman’s similar fare No Strings Attached and is the latest R-rated comedy to strike a chord this year. In June Bad Teacher, also starring Timberlake, opened on $2m from 427 screens while surprise smash Bridesmaids took $3.4m from 482 sites on debut.

Universal’s Jane Eyre was the third and final film to gross over £1m last weekend, managing a decent £1m. However, director Cary Fukunaga’s reimagining of Charlotte Bronte’s classic played on a healthy 422 screens which meant a mediocre screen average of £2,398. The film has already outgrossed Franco Zeffirelli’s 1996 Miramax version of the book starring Charlotte Gainsbourg.

Smurfs and Rise Of The Planet Of The Apes both continued to play well in their fifth weeks. The former will cross £15m this weekend and the latter will push beyond £20m. Universal’s sixth-placed One Day has taken £6.7m to date.

The weekend’s only other top 15 newcomers were Entertainment’s seventh-placed action Colombiana which disappointed on £424,029 from 332 screens at an average of £1,277, Momentum’s Norwegian comedy-thriller Troll Hunter, which made £200,607 from 83 screens at £2,417 per screen and Yash Raj’s Mere Brother Ki Dulhan, which debuted on £173,026 from only 39 screens for the weekend’s third-best screen average of £4,437.

This weekend sees a hefty 16 new films enter the market, including saturation releases for StudioCanal’s Tinker Tailer Soldier Spy, Sony’s 30 Minutes Or Less, Universal comedy The Change-Up, Entertainment’s I don’t Know How She Does It  and Eros’ Mausam.