Tops at the Box Office: Twilight sinks it's fangs into The Muppets

1. The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn pt. 1- $42M/$221M
In it's second week, Twilight held off a ton of formidable competition to maintain the top spot, although the 70% drop off suggests those who stayed up late for midnight screenings or waited in line for days didn't come back for another helping of this turkey. With basically nothing new coming out next week, chances are the film will do modest business again before losing out to (hopefully) Hugo and The Muppets.

2. The Muppets- $29.5M/$42M
Well, hopefully this will erase the bad memories of 1999's disastrous Muppets in Space. The Muppets is off to a solid start at $42M, putting it within a week of surpassing The Muppet Movie's $65M haul way back in 1979, although this one won't approach it adjusted for inflation. The only question I have is how much money the film needs to make to earn back Disney's heavy marketing expenses, what with all those spoof trailers and posters.
3. Happy Feet Two- $13.4M/$43.8M
Well, the film only dipped about 37% from last week, and audiences loved revisiting these penguins with the Debbie Allen-esque choreography. The problem is that the film cost somewhere in the neighborhood of $140M+, and at this rate Warner Brothers isn't likely to sign up for another dance.
4. Arthur Christmas- $12.7M/$17M
The first true family holiday film out of the gate(Harold & Kumar doesn't count) got off to a rocky start, although movies like this tend to stick around for awhile. The British/American joint production does have a 92% fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes, so people clearly loved it. That may be the studio's last, best hope if they want to recoup the $100M production budget.
5. Hugo- $11.3M/$15.4M
There are a couple of reasons not to despair about the mediocre performance of Martin Scorsese's Hugo. For one, it only opened at 1270+ theaters, which is a few thousand less than Twilight and a couple thousand less than The Muppets. So there's plenty of room for growth. The film has a blistering 97% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, and an A- CinemaScore, which means critics and audiences alike love it. But will those scores translate into the numbers this film deserves? It doesn't fit neatly with the other adventure films coming out this season, and adults may want to spend their money on something less like a history lesson. I hope I'm proven wrong on this because Hugo deserves to be paid attention to, if only to ensure more movies like it keep getting made.
6. Jack & Jill- $10.3M/$57.4M
7. Immortals- $8.8M/$68.6M
Golf clap for Tarsem Singh as Immortals crosses $130M worldwide. The inevitable sequel should be totally dialogue free, except for the groans of gods when they look in the mirror at their silly outfits.
8. Puss in Boots-$7.45M/$133M
9. Tower Heist- $7.32M/$65.4M
10. The Descendants- $7.2M/$10.7M
A bump of 400 theaters averaging over $16000 keeps The Descendants ruling the indie circuit, and possibly threatening more if it expands further. With the Oscar buzz swirling around George Clooney and writer/director Alexander Payne, don't be surprised if you see this film hanging around a month from now.