Rambo Beaten By Spartan Spoof

Sylvester Stallone failed to do at the box office this weekend what his previous “Rocky Balboa” was able to accomplish, become a big ticket winning surprise. Instead, the jungle fighting mercenary of the underdog took second to “Meet the Spartans, a satiric farce send-up to last year’s “300.”

The Spartans spoof won the weekend with a box office take of nearly $19 million with “Rambo,” clearly the best movie fare over the last three days, pulling in at number two with a little over $18 million.

Critics have been praising the 61 year old Stallone once again after resurrecting a character he hasn’t played in years.

“I think everyone expected ‘Rambo’ to be No. 1,” said Paul Dergarabedian, president of Media by Numbers.

However, it appears that audiences were more in the mood for some mindless entertainment than for serious trips about the current sad Burmese state-of-affairs, which “Rambo,” in its own Stallone-style tried to address. Still, one needn’t cry for Sly. $18.2 million is nothing to sneeze at and that kind of money, along with his performance in “Rocky Balboa,” continues to prove that the muscle-bound senior citizen can still pull an audience into movie houses.

We will have the full Top Ten weekend box office films for you later.