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LOS ANGELES - Ben Stiller and Will Smith ruled the North American box office for a second consecutive weekend with their respective movies Night at the Museum and The Pursuit of Happyness, while Dreamgirls danced its way up to No 3 in its first full weekend of wide release.
According to studio estimates issued today, overall sales were higher than last weekend, with business on New Year's Eve expected to be considerably stronger than it was a week ago on Christmas Eve.
Museum earned US$37.8 million during the three days beginning Friday, taking its two-week haul to US$116.9 million. Stiller plays a security guard at a museum where the exhibits -- such as dinosaurs and Roman armies -- come to life at night. The family comedy, released by News Corp's 20th Century Fox, was coolly reviewed by critics.
Smith's Happyness, a fact-based rags-to-riches tale, followed at No 2 with US$19.3 million. The movie, released by Sony Corp's Columbia Pictures, has earned US$98.4 million after three weeks, and is on track to become Smith's 10th US$100 million movie.
Dreamgirls, a long-in-the-works musical that has been attracting major Oscar buzz for months, jumped four places to No 3 with US$15.5 million.
The film widened to 852 theatres on Christmas Day after a week of special engagements in New York, Los Angeles and San Francisco, and will expand to about 1800 theatres on January 12. (By contrast, Museum and Happyness are playing in 3768 theatres and 2870 theatres respectively.)
Loosely based on the story of Motown group the Supremes, Dreamgirls has earned US$38.5 million to date.
Paramount's family movie Charlotte's Web rose one to No 4 with US$12 million, which was larger than its US$11.5 million opening two weekends ago. It has earned US$52.9 million to date.
Sylvester Stallone's boxing drama Rocky Balboa dropped two to No 5 with US$11.4 million in its second round, taking its total to US$48.8 million. It was released by closely held Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.
The top 12 films earned US$147.8 million, according to tracking firm Media By Numbers. The tally represented a 36 per cent improvement from last weekend, and was 12 per cent higher than the year-ago period.
In limited release the best performer was Pan's Labyrinth, Mexican director Guillermo del Toro's violent fairytale set during the aftermath of the Spanish Civil War, which earned almost US$600,000 from 17 theatres. It was released by Picturehouse, a joint venture between Time Warner Inc. units New Line Cinema and HBO.
Notes on a Scandal, starring Cate Blanchett and Judi Dench, also did well, earning about US$408,000 from 22 theatres in seven cities. It was released by News Corp's arthouse arm Fox Searchlight.
- REUTERS
