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The fourth of July, Valentine's Day, December. No matter what time of the year, Will Smith delivers the goods.

I Am Legend

After weeks of build, the biggest December tentpole in awhile delivers in spades. I Am Legend raked in an incredible $30.7 million on Friday. While it doesn't touch any of the summer single-day records, this is still a phenominal figure. Only one other December release has ever scored a higher single day figure, the opening day of Return of the King back in 2003. Chalk it up to audiences that have been starved for much of anything for nearly a month now, and the ever-impressive drawing power of Will Smith. Even going with a very conservative multiplier of 2.6 since there's really nothing that could provide a legitimite comparison, that is still a fantastic opening weekend of $79.8 million.

Alvin and the Chipmunks

Perhaps neck and neck with I Am Legend for the biggest box office story of the weekend is a film adaptation of Alvin and the Chipmunks, which inexplicably opened with $13.3 million on Friday. I'm not even going to attempt to figure this one out, but the even worse news is that being targeted squarely at the pre-teen set, it should have an above average multiplier this weekend. Let's call it 3.2, which is a $42.5 million weekend. I think I need to go lie down now.

The Perfect Holiday

Another This Christmas it's not, as The Perfect Holiday could only muster $700,000 on Friday. Which is more than the $600,000 it made on Wednesday and Thursday. Expect about $2 million over the rest of the weekend.

Atonement

Helped greatly by seven Golden Globe nominations, Atonement earned about $500,000 on just 117 screens on Friday. Your second mortal lock for a Best Picture nominee (following No Country for Old Men) should come in this weekend with about $1.5 million and will only add more screens over the holidays.

Notable Holdovers

The Golden Compass goes from slight disappointment to out and out disaster as it plunges 69% from a week ago with only $2.7 million on Friday. There's no sugar-coating here anymore, this expensive mistake is going to cost somebody their job. Expect about $9.3 million in its second weekend.

Projected Estimates for the Top Ten (Three-Day)
Projected Rank	Film	Estimated Gross
1	I Am Legend	79.8
2	Alvin and the Chipmunks	42.5
3	The Golden Compass	9.3
4	Enchanted	5.9
5	No Country For Old Men	2.6
6	This Christmas	2.5
7	Fred Claus	2.5
8	The Perfect Holiday	1.9
9	August Rush	1.8
10	Atonement	1.5