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For Vince Vaughn, this is another wildly popular comedy that few liked and few will remember. Vaughn's last effort was in Four Christmases, which opened to a similar $31 million in November last year. Four Christmases was 25% fresh, but was able to slide from Thanksgiving through Christmas, and finish with a domestic total of $120 million. Prior to that, Vaughn was in another Christmas comedy, Fred Claus, and while Fred didn't open strongly ($18.5 million), it had strong legs, and finished with $72 million. Fred Claus was also dreck, finishing with a rotten rating of 21%. The last one I'll mention is The Break-Up, which opened just short of $40 million, finished with $119 million and was 33% fresh. Suffice to say, Vince Vaughn is hugely popular, but man does he make bad movies.

Finishing second is the refreshingly good movie called Zombieland, last weekend's number one flick, which earned $15 million from 3,038 venues. After debuting last weekend to $24.1 million, Zombieland had to face comedy competition in the form of Couples Retreat this weekend, and lost 39% of its audience compared to last weekend. Considering this is a pseudo-horror flick, I think Sony and Columbia will be very happy with this drop, as horror films tend to drop 50% plus in their second weekends, and the budget for the Woody Harrelson flick ($23.6 million) was recouped in the first frame. With continued decent holds, Zombieland could end up as an $80 million film, as it has a total after ten days of $47.8 million.

Third spot goes to Cloudy With A Chance of Meatballs, which enjoys its fourth weekend above $10 million as it holds very well. Meatballs earned another $12 million and drops a fantastic 24% compared to last weekend's earnings. Why the slim drop after dipping a much larger 37% last weekend? After a weekend of having both Meatballs and the Toy Story Double Feature both in 3-D, theater owners were able to improve scheduling, allowing both films to perform strongly this weekend. Also, instead of being mostly excluded from those 3-D screens in the last frame, the 15% increase to ticket prices was like a tap being shut off, and this weekend the tap is back on, with Meatballs is enjoying the difference. Cloudy With A Chance of Meatballs should have another strong frame next weekend, and has a four-weekend total thus far of $96.3 million.

Speaking of the Toy Story 3-D double feature, it finished fourth, down one spot from last weekend. The Disney/Pixar rehash earned $7.7 million in its second frame and was down 39% compared to last weekend. Disney is getting good at making something from nothing, as this works as marketing for Toy Story 3, and has similarities to last April's Earth, where the Mouse House re-assembled already shot footage and made $30 million off the deal. The Toy Story Double Feature has now earned $22.7 million.

Fifth spot goes to the unexpected wild card Paranormal Activity. Out to only 159 venues, this extremely low budget horror flick somehow earned an amazing $7.1 million, giving it a wild venue average of $44,440. This one was made for only $11,000 (yes, thousand) before being picked up by Paramount, who saw Blair Witch possibilities. Obviously, it found Blair Witch results – the original no budget horror flick earned $1.5 million from only 27 venues and had an opening weekend venue average of $56,000. Blair Witch managed to improve on those results in the second frame by earning $2 million from 31 venues, giving it a $64,000 venue average. It went on to earn $140 million domestically in 1999. Will lightning strike twice? Maybe, and Paramount's off to a great start with Paranormal Activity.

Sixth spot goes to Bruce Willis and Surrogates, the promising title that missed. Now in its third weekend, Surrogates earned $4.1 million and drops 43% compared to last weekend. The $80 million feature has now earned $32.6 million domestically.

The Invention of Lying ends up seventh this weekend, as this is another Ricky Gervais flick that is struggling to find an audience. Lying earned $3.4 million in its second weekend, and sees a troubling drop of 52% compared to last weekend. The $18 million Warner Bros. flick now has a total of $12.3 million.

Fox Searchlight's Whip It lands in eighth, and due to some solid reviews has a decent drop in its second frame. Whip It earned $2.8 million this weekend and falls 40%. Unfortunately, it's going to be too little too late, as Drew Barrymore's $15 million feature has a total so far of $8.8 million.

Ninth spot goes to Michael Moore's Capitalism: A Love Story. Even a Michael Moore doc can't find the legs this weekend, as this one earned only $2.7 million and drops 39%. It's going to leave the top ten quick, with a total of only $9.1 million.

Fame, MGM's big miss, is tenth. Fame earned $2.6 million in its third frame and was off 45%. The poorly made and marketed remake has earned $20 million so far.

Overall this weekend, things are looking pretty good. Thanks to Couples Retreat, the top 12 films at the box office earned a plentiful $96.3 million. Last year, with Body of Lies failing and Beverly Hills Chihuahua repeating on top, the box office top 12 earned $86.6 million, leaving last year well back of this year. Next weekend things get really interesting. Spike Jonze's Where The Wild Things Are finally arrives at theaters, and will compete against Law Abiding Citizen and The Stepfather. How big will Wild Things be? I'm thinking huge, but check back next weekend to find out.

Top Weekend Box Office for 10/9/09-10/11/09 (Actuals)
Rank	Film	Distributor	Estimated Gross	Actual Gross	Weekly Change	Running Total
1	Couples Retreat	Universal	$35,340,000	$34,286,740	New	$34,286,740
2	Zombieland	Sony (Columbia)	$15,000,000	$14,802,431	- 40.2%	$47,603,512
3	Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs	Sony/Columbia	$12,000,000	$11,527,480	- 27.1%	$95,778,436
4	Paranormal Activity	Paramount	$7,066,000	$7,900,695	New	$9,113,936
5	Toy Story/Toy Story 2 3d	WALT DISNEY	N/A	$7,766,643	New	$22,768,991
6	Surrogates	Touchstone Pictures	$4,115,000	$4,268,314	- 41.1%	$32,725,781
7	The Invention of Lying	Warner Bros. Pictures	$3,370,000	$3,339,263	- 52.5%	$12,295,868
8	Whip It	Fox Searchlight Pictures	$2,800,000	$2,827,512	- 39.2%	$8,793,570
9	Capitalism: A Love Story	Overture Films	$2,700,000	$2,630,292	- 40.9%	$9,025,483
10	Fame	MGM	$2,556,000	$2,543,067	- 45.0%	$20,028,829
11	The Informant!	Warner Bros. Pictures	$2,210,000	$2,204,286	- 40.3%	$29,847,434
12	Tyler Perry's I Can Do Bad All by Myself	Lionsgate	$1,475,000	$1,511,904	- 41.8%	$50,383,561
	Also Opening/Notables
	Free Style	Samuel Goldwyn Pictures	$105,705	$97,764	New	$97,764
	Passport To Love	Variance	$47,250	$46,012	New	$46,012
	Bronson	Magnolia	N/A	$10,940	New	$10,940
	Peter and Vandy		N/A	$7,323	New	$7,323
	Adventures of Power	Variance	$6,000	$4,254	New	$4,254
	Visual Acoustics	Arthouse	N/A	$3,517	New	$3,517
	The Wedding Song	Strand	N/A	$1,240	New	$1,240
	A Serious Man	Focus Features	$446,701	$459,318	+ 82.7%	$811,304
Click here for all weekend data
Box office data supplied by Exhibitor Relations

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