Weekend Roundup: Babies On Top

By Katey Rich

In the battle of two sets of buddies setting out on misadventures, the Amy Poehler-Tina Fey duo of Baby Mama ruled the box office this weekend. The comedy brought in $18 million, a solid $4 million over their nearest competition, Harold and Kumar Escape From Guantanamo Bay. Both openings were merely decent, but a little bit over expectations. Hey, you only have to wait a few more days before the blockbuster weekends start rolling in!

The other wide release of the weekend didn't fare nearly as well as the two champs; Deception barely squeaked into the top 10, with just $2.2 million to its name. It was even beaten out by 88 Minutes, which was the critical whipping boy the weekend before and landed at #8 with $3.6 million. Somehow we're living in a parallel universe in which bad Al Pacino > bad (yet sexy) Ewan McGregor + Hugh Jackman.

The rest of the holdovers fared much better, with Forgetting Sarah Marshall coming in behind Forbidden Kingdom again, despite a smaller drop in audience. Kingdom made $11.2 million at #3, while Marshall made $11 million at #4. Both are facing stiff competition from the coming wave of summer blockbusters, but Marshall looks more likely to hang on. Speaking of hanging on, Nim's Island is quietly becoming a hit despite never having made it to #1; it stayed in place at #5 and made another $4.5 million, bringing its tally to $38 million. Those are no blockbuster numbers, but for a movie that was initially written off along with its fellow opening-weekend flop Leatherheads, an impressive performance.

Behind Nim were the current teen-centric offerings, Prom Night and 21, which came in at #6 with $4.4 million and #7 with $4 million, respectively. And finally there's Horton Hears a Who! at #9 with $2.4 million, likely making its last appearance in the top 10. Thank you, Horton, for all that you've done for bolstering the spring box office until Iron Man hopefully comes along to save the day.

After the jump is the full top 20, which features The Visitor for the first time after the acclaimed drama added nearly 60 screens. The rest are all familiar faces from the 10-20 group, and many of them are shedding theatres so quickly we probably won't be seeing them around these parts again.

TW	LW	Title (click to view)	Studio	Weekend Gross	% Change	Theater Count / Change		Average	Total Gross	Budget*	Week #
1	N	Baby Mama	Uni.	$18,271,000	-	2,543	-	$7,184	$18,271,000	$30	1
2	N	Harold and Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay	NL	$14,570,000	-	2,510	-	$5,804	$14,570,000	$12	1
3	1	The Forbidden Kingdom	LGF	$11,230,000	-47.5%	3,151	-	$3,563	$38,255,000	-	2
4	2	Forgetting Sarah Marshall	Uni.	$11,014,000	-37.9%	2,799	+1	$3,934	$35,077,000	$30	2
5	5	Nim's Island	Fox	$4,525,000	-20.4%	2,977	-300	$1,519	$38,954,000	$37	4
6	3	Prom Night (2008)	SGem	$4,400,000	-49.3%	2,821	+121	$1,559	$38,115,000	$20	3
7	6	21	Sony	$4,000,000	-27.5%	2,952	+49	$1,355	$75,775,000	$35	5
8	4	88 Minutes	Sony	$3,600,000	-48.3%	2,168	-	$1,660	$12,632,000	-	2
9	8	Dr. Seuss' Horton Hears a Who!	Fox	$2,410,000	-31.4%	2,159	-511	$1,116	$147,883,000	$85	7
10	N	Deception (2008)	Fox	$2,225,000	-	2,001	-	$1,111	$2,225,000	-	1
11	7	Street Kings	FoxS	$2,125,000	-49.2%	1,735	-734	$1,224	$23,682,000	$20	3
12	9	Leatherheads	Uni.	$1,815,000	-40.5%	2,255	-543	$804	$29,276,000	$58	4
13	10	Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed	RM	$1,379,000	-53.6%	1,041	-11	$1,324	$5,282,000	-	2
14	12	Smart People	Mira.	$909,000	-43.2%	1,036	-83	$877	$8,298,000	-	3
15	11	Superhero Movie	MGM/W	$853,000	-47.0%	1,103	-777	$773	$24,897,000	-	5
16	30	The Visitor	Over.	$508,000	+205.1%	76	+58	$6,684	$857,000	-	3
17	18	Shine a Light	ParV	$419,000	-26.2%	218	-2	$1,922	$4,400,000	-	4
18	13	The Ruins	P/DW	$415,000	-65.7%	722	-1,135	$574	$16,669,000	-	4
19	17	Under the Same Moon	Wein.	$400,000	-31.6%	453	-1	$883	$11,784,000	-	6
20	14	Drillbit Taylor	Par.	$384,000	-57.1%	702	-665	$547	$30,353,000	-	6