American Animation in Foreign Lands

Is doing quite nicely, thank you very much.

... Coming in No. 3 at the international box office over the July 18-20 weekend was DreamWorks Animation toon "Kung Fu Panda," which grossed $29 million from 6,506 playdates for a hearty cume of $273.2 million. Pic's worldwide gross is a pleasing $479.8 million [interestingly, the Hollywood Reporter gives the overseas cume on Panda as $305 million, for a combined total gross north of half a billion bucks]...

Disney's "Wall-E" opened in second with $8.5 million at 501. The Pixar toon, which has been heavily promoted in Blighty, scored an impressive screen average of $16,990.

Overall weekend U.K. biz was upbeat with the top six pics in the charts clearing $1 million. "Hancock" and "Kung Fu Panda" both put in decent showings in their third outings. Third-placed "Hancock" dipped 45% to $4 million and a $41.6 million. "Panda" dropped 46% to $3 million and a cume of $27.7 million.

Like I always say, the more successful American animation is overseas, the more American animation will get made. And by American, I mean "made in the United States," no offense to Mexicans and Canadians, who are also Americans, in the hemispheric sense of the word.

But hey. I've got an economic self-interest in seeing animated features from here wail at the box office. No point in me being cute trying to dress it up any other way.