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Finishing second this weekend is Skyfall, as MGM and Sony put out a strong follow up to the shaky Quantum of Solace. After a huge opening weekend at $88.4 million (with a great weekend multiplier for the franchise at 2.9), Skyfall had to face off against the Twilight film, which meant 007 would likely be pushed to the smaller screens at your local megaplex. That push hurt Skyfall, but didn’t completely kneecap it. James Bond earned $41.5 million in its second weekend, dropping 53%. That’s way better than Quantum of Solace did against the first entry of Twilight in 2008 (interesting aside: the Twilight series put out five films between Bond entries). Quantum fell 60% in its second weekend, dipping from $67.5 million to $26.7 million. Casino Royale, on the other hand, opened to less than half of Skyfall at only $40.8 million, and fell only 25% to $30.8 million in its second weekend. With the super strong opening frame, Skyfall is going to easily outgross its Daniel Craig predecessors. It currently has $161.3 million in the bank, and another half-billion from overseas sales. This Bond is a hit.

Third spot this weekend goes to Steven Spielberg, Daniel Day-Lewis, and Lincoln. After an amazing limited release performance last weekend, where it earned $944,000 from only 11 screens, Lincoln was ready to take the big stage this weekend. Buena Vista pushed the release count up to 1,775, and the Oscar worthy film brought in a crackerjack $21 million. That gives the drama an impressive venue average of $11,831, particularly because the screen count and competition for theaters made this opening a lot tougher.

Obviously, the reviews helped. Lincoln is 91% fresh at RottenTomatoes, with the "top critics" score coming in even higher, at 95%. With Lincoln, audiences know they are paying for quality entertainment, instead of the crap issued for our number one entry this weekend. Lincoln cost Buena Vista $65 million to make, and it has already returned $22.4 million. Given some of the remarkably good releases we have already seen this year, it is going to be an interesting Oscar season, and I won’t have to worry about Twilight showing up.

That puts Wreck-It Ralph down to fourth, as the Disney release takes a tumble in weekend three. After a solid sophomore frame where Ralph earned $33 million and fell only 33%, this weekend was not as kind. This weekend, Wreck-It took in $18.3 million and fell 45%. Last weekend, the competition was Bond. This weekend, it's Twilight, Bond and Lincoln, as the squeeze is on for Ralph. Still, the animated throwback has done quite well, earning $121.5 million so far against its $165 million budget. Wreck-It Ralph will have Rise of the Guardians to deal with next weekend, so getting to $200 million domestic is going to be a really tough task to accomplish.

Flight moves down two spots to fifth place. Now three weekends old, Flight would have had to deal with the expansion of Lincoln this weekend, as both these films, and to a degree Skyfall, were chasing that more refined ticket buyer than the Breaking Dawn crowd. Flight earned $8.6 million and dropped 43%. The competition will only heat up next weekend with Life of Pi and The Silver Linings Playbook showing up. The good news for Flight is that it cost only $31 million to make and has a gross so far of $61.3 million. It looks like it will finish with about $85 million.

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