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The Proposal cost Touchstone, Mandeville Films (Beverly Hills Chihuahua, Raising Helen and the upcoming Surrogates) and Kurtzman/Orci (the executive producers of Star Trek) only $40 million to make. That means that this rom-com is going to be a great investment for its producers, as Sandra Bullock is just as reliable overseas as she is in America. Domestically, The Proposal has the romantic comedy genre all to itself until mid-July when the Ugly Truth opens with Katherine Heigl. However, it will run into chick-flick territory when My Sister's Keeper opens next Friday.

Second spot goes to The Hangover, and despite dropping to second, the shine certainly has not come off the comedy that would make The Proposal blush. The Hangover enjoyed its third weekend of release with a gross of $26.9 million, which joins its other solid weekends of $45 million and $32.8 million. The biggest news for The Hangover this weekend is its slim drop. The Warner Bros. flick fell only 18%, which is an amazing hold for any film in its third frame. This one is still doing impressive weekday business as well. In the last week, The Hangover did not have a gross less than $5 million, as it pulled in about $22 million from Monday-to-Thursday. At this point, it looks like The Hangover is going to easily outgross even Wedding Crashers, which finished its amazing Summer 2005 run with $210 million. So far, The Hangover has earned $152.9 million, and could be on its way to as much as $250 million, all against a budget of only $35 million.

Third spot was a showdown between Jack Black and Michael Cera in Year One, and Pixar's Up. The winner was Up, which has another fabulous frame. After finishing the previous weekend with a $30.8 million, Up drops 31% this weekend to $21.3 million. Up crossed the $200 million mark on Thursday, its 21st day of release, which means it took one day longer than Finding Nemo did in 2003. Up now has a cumulative gross of $224.1 million, as it looks to finish toward the upper ranges of $200 million. It should have another healthy frame next weekend even against Transformers, but then it may be called Down in the following weekend when it faces off against Ice Age 3, as it will lose its 3-D venues

Up's third place finish means that fourth goes to Year One, which grossed a slightly higher-than-expected $20.2 million from 3,022 venues. It had an average of $6,684. Personally, I'm quite surprised that Year One managed to gross as much as it did, considering it had a stream of unfunny TV ads (starting with the Super Bowl) and trailers. Reviews were as bad as I expected them to be (20% fresh at RT), and I can only guess that the Paul Blart fanclub drove this one above $20 million. For Jack Black, this debut is right in line with some of his other opening weekends like School of Rock ($19.6 million opening), Shallow Hal ($22.5 million opening) and Tropic Thunder ($25.8 million opening). For Michael Cera, this is another strong first weekend to add to his resume, after Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist ($11.3 million opening), Superbad ($33.1 million opening) and Juno ($143.5 million domestic finish). I think Year One will pay more of a price when Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen opens next weekend than The Proposal, but one never knows.

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