This final weekend leading into Christmas featured a wholesale swap of the top ten, with six titles entering the upper echelon. Overall, it was a pretty good weekend for movie-going, with the top three films combining for a total tally well north of $100 million. It also saw good openings for a number of newly released films and a strong expansion of another. I know I did my part going out and seeing as many of these films as I could.
Leading the box office charge is the sequel to the 2004 hit National Treasure. National Treasure: Book of Secrets brought Nicolas Cage the best opening of his career, narrowly besting Ghost Rider from earlier this year (based on studio estimates). The movie is a fun adventure, nothing great by any stretch. What it provides is a fun adventure suitable for the whole family, and those are few and far between these days. Silly as the plot may be, it does exactly what it sets out to accomplish. Based on its reception, it would appear to be a shoe-in to cross the $100 million mark and head towards besting, or at least matching, the $173 million take of the original.
Following that are last week's top two bread winners. Will Smith's I Am Legend slipped a respectable 55% from last week, which was to be expected based on its monstrous opening. It further solidifies Will Smith as one of the most bankable stars in Hollywood as he matches Tom Hanks record of seven $100 million films in a row, a record that could be broken when Hancock opens in July. Right behind that is Alvin and the Chipmunks, the surprise hit from last weekend. It fell less than 40% from its opening mark. I saw the film and it was surprisingly good, not great but definitely watchable.
Next up are three new releases in a row. First, in fourth, is Charlie Wilson's War, the Tom Hanks political comedy. Next is Tim Burton's spectacular screen telling of Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street. Rounding out the trilogy is PS I Love You, Gerard's Butler first film since 300 put him on the map.
There was one other new release to enter the top ten, although it is already being branded a flop. Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story opened in 8th place with an estimated $4.1 million. It deserves to do better than that. It is a very funny take on the music biopic genre that has been Oscar bait over the past few years. John C. Reilly delivers one of the best performances of his career in the Jake Kasdan directed, Judd Apatow written film.
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