Lights Camera Action Satisfaction
1 Eagle Eye $29,200,000 $8,319 $29,200,000
2 Nights in Rodanthe $13,570,000 $5,018 $13,570,000
3 Lakeview Terrace $7,000,000 (-53.3%) $2,837 $25,700,000
4 Fireproof $6,514,000 $7,764 $6,514,000
5 Burn After Reading $6,169,000 (-44.1%) $2,329 $45,540,000
6 Igor $5,500,000 (-29.5%) $2,349 $14,339,000
7 Righteous Kill $3,803,000 (-48.8%) $1,263 $34,805,000
8 My Best Friend’s Girl $3,800,000 (-54.0%) $1,442 $14,529,000
9 Miracle at St. Anna $3,501,000 $2,954 $3,501,000
10 Tyler Perry’s The Family That Preys $3,160,000 (-56.5%) $1,970 $32,796,000

This just in: A copy of Lady Beware, some Pinot Noir, and some hotel hand lotion. It’s going to be special.

Shia’s a movie star y’all. Think about it, take a second. (drop it like it’s hot). Eagle Eye opened to nearly $30 Million dollars, but as much as it was a concept picture, Paramount and Dreamworks have knighted Shia, and he’s on his way. Where it goes from here is anyone’s guess. Will Eagle Eye make it to $100? Unlikely. But still. Shia’s got Transformers 2 next summer. He will have been in three $300 Million+ films by then. Maybe he’ll be the Lone Ranger to Depp’s Tonto. Maybe. Or maybe Will Smith (he could wear a white mask). I like to spitball. But what I love more is to spittake. Or eat some Shittake mushrooms. So delish!

This was followed up by Nights in Rodanthe, which is one of those films that could hang in there. I hope women have trucked with Diane Lane, as I think her career was hurt by being so drop dead gorgeous for so much of her life (up to and including now). I could and will make jokes about how’s she been attractive for thirty years of screen time (though now that she’s with Josh Brolin, I don’t want to insult either. When she was with Christopher Lambert I don’t think I would have had problems insinuating every devious fantasy I might have in store for her, but with Brolin – after last year – hats are off and gloves are on), but I don’t her appeal and her talent became evident until A Walk on the Moon, which was when Hollywood realized that this women had some game, and I don’t think it was until Unfaithful that both audiences and Hollywood realized that she was the hottest middle-aged woman in America: at that point it became less threatening, I’m a guessing. So that $13.5 mil may yet turn into $40 or $60 Million with the long play audience a film like this can attract.

Lakeview Terrace paid Sam Jackson well enough, and with this weekend’s take it’s now made more than its budget (a reported $20). Will it get to $40? That’s probably likely, and Neil Labutte can call this his most successful film ever. Fireproof opened somewhat better than I thought, but it will struggle to cross $20 – if that, and it will likely be out of the top ten next week. Board member James Kimbell offered this nugget from the IMDb: “Kirk Cameron, a fundamentalist Christian evangelist, refuses to kiss any woman other than his wife under any circumstance, so to film a scene in which his character in Fireproof kisses his wife, the filmmakers had to dress Cameron’s real-life wife, Chelsea Noble, as the wife character (played throughout the rest of the movie by Erin Bethea) and shoot the kissing scene in shadow so the difference between Noble and Bethea would not be as evident onscreen.”

Burn After Reading is still playing, while Igor – being the only kids films – did not eat pavement. You know what did? Spike Lee’s latest. Disney didn’t believe in it, and therefore you get a tepid response to a tepid release. Stick a fork in Dane Cooked. Yeah, I went there. Righteous Kill isn’t a complete embarrassment. Ho-hah. and Tyler Perry’s baseline is now $30. Expect the next Medea film to do $10 Mil more.

Batman has left the top ten. Which may be why we saw the DVD and Blu-ray announcement this week. So has Ghost Town, but we won’t see that announcement for at least a couple of days. See you kids on the Thursday tip.