| Rank | Title | Weekend Gross | Total Gross | Weeks in Release |
| 1 | Borat | $29,000,000 | $67,840,000 | 2 |
| 2 | Santa Clause 3 | $16,893,000 | $41,052,000 | 2 |
| 3 | Flushed Away | $16,710,000 | $39,931,000 | 2 |
| 4 | Stranger Than Fiction |
$14,100,000 | $14,100,000 | 1 |
| 5 | Saw III | $6,600,000 | $69,879,000 | 3 |
| 6 | Babel | $5,651,000 | $7,488,000 | 3 |
| 7 | The Departed | $5,240,000 | $109,778,000 | 6 |
| 8 | The Return |
$4,776,000 | $4,776,000 | 1 |
| 9 | The Prestige | $4,630,000 | $46,037,000 | 4 |
| 10 | A Good Year | $3,775,000 | $3,775,000 | 1 |
Greetings from Burbank, California! I’m right in the heart of Movieland, not far at all from many of the major studios, and scant yards from where Snoop Dogg was arrested a couple of weeks back. I’m trapped in the airport due to major storms back East, but it’s given me time to listen to what the Hollywood elite is saying. And what they’re saying is, “Ridley Scott really shit the bed this weekend.”
I mean, ouch. A Good Year, the latest reteaming of Scott and his Gladiator, Russell Crowe, debuted at number 10, taking in only a few million dollars. Nobody at Fox is celebrating that – except for the people behind Borat, which continues in at #1, building off the major awareness created last weekend with the limited release. The movie went very, very wide and pulled in lots and lots of money.
Borat leads the “same as last week” crowd, as The Santa Clause and Flushed Away. Debuting quite anemically after them is Stranger Than Fiction, the “serious” Will Ferrell movie that a lot of journalists seem to be eating up. The Return, yet another Sarah Michelle Gellar remake of a Japanese horror movie, couldn’t work the kind of magic other recent horror films like The Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning and Saw III were able to pull off. Maybe we’re finally done with that whole genre.
Next week is a big one: the James Bond prequel/reboot, Casino Royale (which is pretty damn great), opens, as does Warner Bros’ supposed CGI powerhouse Happy Feet. Let’s Go to Prison, the dark, ass-raping comedy from Bob Odenkirk starring Will Arnett and Dax Shepard, also comes out. I did an interview with Shepard for that film and they wouldn’t let me see the film – take that as you will. I’ll be paying to see it, I guess. Also opening is Fast Food Nation, Richard Linklater’s interesting – if not wholly successful – take on Eric Schlosser’s non-fiction expose of the fast food and meat industries.