Jarhead heads UK box office

Sam Mendes' Gulf War drama Jarhead has hit the top of the UK box office chart.

The film tells the story of US marines before the war and stars Jake Gyllenhaal (Donnie Darko, The Day After Tomorrow) and Jamie Foxx (Ray, Any Given Sunday).

Director Mendes, who also made American Beauty and Road To Perdition, is now turning his attentions to a musical version of Sweeney Todd.

Second place in the chart compiled by Screen International is The Chronicles Of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch And The Wardrobe, featuring Jim Broadbent, Tilda Swinton and Rupert Everett.

The top five films was completed with Just Friends, starring Ryan Reynolds and Amy Smart, Ang Lee's Brokeback Mountain (also featuring Gyllenhaal alongside Randy Quaid and Heath Ledger) and Peter Jackson's monkey movie King Kong.

Jackson's next project after the grand Lord Of The Rings trilogy and King Kong will be the far more low-key The Lovely Bones.

Based on the book of the same name, the film will tell the story of a murdered teenager who looks down on Earth from heaven as the search is on for her body.

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