Hot “Ice Age” breaks $100 million box-office mark

By Kemp Powers

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – “Ice Age: The Meltdown” became the
first movie this year to break the $100 million mark and fended
off four new rivals to top the box office for the second
weekend in a row, according to studio estimates released on
Sunday.

The animated sequel sold $34.5 million worth of tickets
during the three-day weekend, bringing its cumulative 10-day
haul to $116.4 million, distributor 20th Century Fox said. That
compares to the $87.3 million its 2002 predecessor made after
the same time. The original went on to earn $176 million.

The News Corp.-owned studio expects numbers to remain
strong as many US schools begin their spring break this week.

“We think the juggernaut will just roll on,” said Chris
Aronson, a senior vice president at 20th Century Fox.

“The Benchwarmers,” a comedy about losers who create a
three-man baseball team, led new releases, generating just over
$20 million in three days to finish second overall. The
Columbia Pictures film also exceeded expectations, the studio
said on Sunday.

The movie played to an audience that was almost evenly
divided between men and women, and 60 percent of the audience
was under the age of 21, Columbia said.

Another new release, New Line’s “Take the Lead,” starring
Antonio Banderas, finished third with $12.7 million. Last
weekend’s No. 2 film, Universal’s “Inside Man,” fell to fourth
place with a three-day total of $9.2 million.

“Lucky Number Slevin,” MGM’s new release, finished fifth
with an opening weekend total of $7.13 million. The weekend’s
final opening, the Fox Searchlight comedy “Phat Girlz,” opened
in ninth place with a weekend total of $3.1 million.

‘SMOKING’ SET FOR WIDER RELEASE

The top 10 films were rounded out by Paramount’s “Failure
to Launch” at number six with $4.1 million, Warner Bros.’ “ATL”
and “V For Vendetta” at seven and eight with $3.7 million and
$3.3 million respectively, and Fox Searchlight’s “Thank You For
Smoking” in 10th with $2.4 million.

“Thank You For Smoking” moved into the top 10 in its fourth
week in release. The film is playing in only 300 theaters, but
will expand to 1,000 theaters on April 14, the studio said.

Overall ticket sales through last weekend stood at about
$2.15 billion, up 1.7 percent from the year-ago period,
according to box office tracking firm Exhibitor Relations. The
number of tickets sold fell 1.3 percent to about 325 million,
it said.

However, beginning with the release of “Inside Man” two
weeks ago, the marketplace halted a five-week decline and has
now seen an up box office for the third weekend in a row.

With the release of “Mission: Impossible III” set for next
month, the industry is expecting a big rebound from last year’s
disappointing summer, Exhibitor Relations said.

New Line Cinema and Warner Bros. are units of Time Warner
Inc. Universal Pictures is a unit of General Electric Co.’s NBC
Universal Inc. Paramount Pictures is a unit of Viacom Inc. Fox
Searchlight and Columbia Pictures are owned by News Corp.