It proved a great weekendfor Entertainment at the UK box office this weekend. Entertainment FilmDistributors released both Blade: Trinity and The Phantom Of TheOpera across the country.

The third instalment in the Bladefranchise landed second place over the three-day weekend with $3.6m (£1.9m) at329 sites, a stunning $10,810 location average. The three-day figures surpassedthose for the original Blade in November 1998 which took $3.1m (£1.6m)from 313 sites, but was not as strong as 2002's sequel which claimed $4.9m(£2.5m) from 345.

Blade Trinity opened in the UK on Wednesday Dec 8 and grossed $5m(£2.6m) over the five-day period.

The Phantom Of Opera opened Friday $2.3m (£1.2m) at 422 sites for a good$5,530 site average. It will be important to see how the musical performs inthe coming weeks to measure its true success.

In December 1996Entertainment launched Evita, also adapted from an Andrew Lloyd Webbermusical, on a single screen London platform for two weeks. It then expanded atthe start of January taking $3.95m (£2.1m) from 335 sites in its third week.The highest number of sites played was 371 in week seven.

Buena Vista International(BVI) also had a strong weekend. The Incredibles held at the top of thechart in its fourth week and has grossed $37.1m (£19.4m) to date. Meanwhilelimited release comedy Garden State launched at 48 venues for eighthplace with $245,639 (£128,366) - an average of $5,120.

Elsewhere Warner Bros' ThePolar Express expanded nationwide taking $2.4m (£1.3m) over the three-dayweekend for third place. The film played in previews over the passed twoweekends taking $1.7m (£867,881) which this week is included in the total grossnot the three-day weekend as the film had previous officially opened on aplatform release.