Just like this summer’s The Bourne Ultimatum, a three-peat which improved on the opening numbers of its previous entries, Resident Evil: Extinction topped the box office charts this weekend, taking in an estimated $23.7 million.

Good Luck Chuck saw more modest returns, pulling in $13.7 million on around 3,100 screens, while Amanda Bynes’ Sydney White couldn’t capitalize on her Hairspray-aided bump in profile, grossing only $5.2 million at around 2,100 sites.

In holdovers, Jodie Foster’s gritty The Brave One dropped 46 percent, good for $7.3 million and $25 cumulatively to date. 3:10 to Yuma added another $6.1 million to its coffers, and now stands at $37 million overall. Mr. Woodcock fell 44 percent, down to $4.9 million for the weekend and $15.6 million in total. Still hanging around in the top 10, meanwhile, are Superbad (which has now raked in over $116 million), the aforementioned The Bourne Ultimatum ($220 million and counting), and sophomore release Dragon Wars, which pulled in $2.5 million to take its total haul to $8.6 million.

In limited release, Across the Universe, a sprawling love story set to the tunes of the Beatles and starring Evan Rachel Wood,
expanded to 275 theaters and pulled in $1.9 million. Sean Penn’s Into the Wild rang up $210,000 on four screens, The Jane Austen Book Club made $149,000 on 25 screens, and The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford made just under $148,000 at five theaters. Meanwhile, December Boys, starring Daniel Radcliffe, added four theaters (for a total of eight), and put another $11,000 in the bank.

Though not on par with previous thrillers Flightplan and Panic Room, Jodie Foster’s gritty, involving The Brave One topped the box office this weekend, ringing up an estimated $14 million on just over 3,300 screens.

3:10 to Yuma, shot up another $9.2 million, which was good enough to hang on to the second spot at the box office.

New openers Mr. Woodcock and South Korean import Dragon Wars, pulled in $9.1 million and $5.4 million, respectively, each bowing at more than 2,230 theaters. The rest of the top 10 was comprised of summer holdovers, with Superbad (which has now crossed $110 million) and Rob Zombie’s Halloween each tallying another $5 million and change, Matt Damon’s The Bourne Ultimatum picking up $4.1 million to pass the $215 million mark domestically (by far the tops in the series), and ping pong comedy Balls of Fury paddling its way to another $3.3 million, good for a $28.8 million total in its third week of release. In its second week, New Line’s super-stylized Shoot ‘Em Up tumbled out of the top 10, down 55 percent to $2.6 million.

In extremely limited release, finally, Across the Universe, a sprawling love story set to the tunes of the Beatles and starring Evan Rachel Wood, pulled in $685,000 at 23 sites. Expanding in air-quote fashion from its New York bow (from a total of two theaters to five), director Griffin Dunne’s Fierce People picked up just over $24,000. Daniel Radcliffe’s December Boys, meanwhile, rang up only $18,000 at four theaters, proving Harry Potter’s wizardry can only do so much.

Topping the box office this past weekend was the rather sigh-inducing Rush Hour 3, which I couldn’t really be bothered to write much about, perhaps because I was still laughing my ass off over this bon mot from director Brett Ratner. The sequel — and first public sighting of Chris Tucker in six years — grossed just over $49 million, a pretty penny but not nearly well enough to offset its bloated price tag.

Stardust, meanwhile, had a lot of trouble selling filmgoers its whimsical touch, pulling in only $9.1 million at 2,540 venues, while Wednesday release Daddy Day Camp flamed out with an estimated $3.4 million over the weekend at just over 2,300 locations.

Matt Damon’s critically and commercially embraced The Bourne Ultimatum rang up another $32.8 million, bringing its total to north of $131 in its second full week of release. The Simpsons Movie, meanwhile, added $11.2 million to its box office totals, which now hover in the $150 million range. In other long-playing news of note, I Now Pronounce You Chuck & Larry, perhaps somewhat improbably, has now grossed over $100 million, though I think at least 10 percent of that should be attributed to Jessica Biel’s ass. Michael Bay’s Transformers, meanwhile, crossed the $300 domestic mark in its 39th day of release. Hot Rod, on the other hand, proves that cultish DVD sales is the chief dominion of a young, up-and-coming Saturday Night Live talent like Andy Samberg; no biggie, same thing more or less happened to Adam Sandler’s Billy Madison, which laid the groundwork for Happy Gilmore and all that followed it.

In super-limited release, finally, Rosario Dawson’s Descent, a muted revenge drama about a sexually abused college student, tallied just $8,400 on two screens, while the canted, refreshing Rocket Science pulled in $58,500 on six screens in advance of a widening this week.

Proving its pan-generational appeal, The Simpsons Movie scored the third-highest opening weekend ever for an animated film, pulling in just under $72 million at 3,922 theaters, ranking behind
only the last two Shrek installments. Needless to say, that was good for the top spot at the box office this past weekend. Last week’s two big debuts, I Now Pronounce You Chuck & Larry (notable only, it must be stressed, for Jessica Biel prancing about in her bra and underwear), and the buoyant musical Hairspray, fell to second and fourth place, respectively, ringing up $19.1 and $15.6 million.

Rounding out the top five were Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, which tallied just over $17 million, and new release No Reservations, starring Catherine Zeta-Jones and Aaron Eckhart, which grossed $11.7 million. Fellow new release I Know Who Killed Me, meanwhile, fell on its sword of bad publicity swirling around star Lindsay Lohan; a late scratch in some rural areas, the movie opened in just over 1,300 theaters, and grossed only $3.4 million.

Among niche pics, Michael Moore’s Sicko — a look at the sorry state of health care in America, and its for-profit manipulation at the hands of corporations — stands on the verge of becoming
the fourth highest grossing documentary of all time, eclipsing the
$21.5 million grossed by Moore’s own Bowling for Columbine.

Jessica Biel prancing about in her bra and underwear helped the desperately unfunny I Now Pronounce You Chuck & Larry claim the top spot at the box office this past weekend, ringing up $34.8 million on 4,400 screens, a very solid number but one still at the bottom end of the spectrum for a live action Adam Sandler comedy bowing at more than 3,000 theaters. In its second week of release, the fifth installment of the Harry Potter franchise pulled in another $32 million at the box office, perhaps somewhat dampened by the fact that everyone was out buying the final tome in the best-selling series.

In news surprising absolutely no one (even Punxsutawney Phil took last week off), Transformers topped the box office chart this past weekend, parlaying its July 2 evening sneak screenings, July 3 proper opening and big mid-week business to a $155 million total haul, around $70.5 million of that coming during the weekend frame. Disney/Pixar’s latest animated masterwork, writer-director Brad Bird’s Ratatouille, rang up $29 million Friday through Sunday, taking its total box office tally to $109 million. Placing third, meanwhile, Live Free or Die Hard pulled in another $17.7 million, raising its cumulative domestic numbers to just under $85 million.

The only other wide release new opener, Warner Bros.’ comedy License to Wed, opened to $10.4 million, while the deadly word-of-mouth on Universal’s Evan Almighty still hadn’t found everyone, resulting in another $8.7 million in theatrical receipts. People want to like Steve Carell, make no mistake about it, but Evan is a neutered film all the way through, and its $79 million-and-counting gross won’t be enough to offset its production costs, conservatively estimated at $175 million.

Rounding out the weekend’s top 10 were John Cusack’s 1408, with just over $7 million, for a $53 million total haul; Knocked Up, with $5.2 million, $132 million total; the Fantastic Four sequel, with another $4.2 million, $123 million total; Michael Moore‘s documentary Sicko, with $3.6 million, $11.5 million total; and Ocean’s Thirteen, which has now tallied just under $110 million domestically, but another $140 million abroad.

Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer proved fantastic at the box office this past weekend, debuting to an estimated $57 million-plus on just over 6,200 screens. Fan-boy gripes about whether Galactus should look like this or rock out with more of the purple-and-blue classic comic look turned out not to have much of an effect on Fantastic Four‘s bottom-line grosses, powered as much by family business as diehard comic book aficionados. The opening was a bit higher than the $56.1 million haul of 2005’s series launch, and easily outpaced theatrical holdovers Ocean’s Thirteen ($19.1 million, down 47 percent from its debut June 8), Knocked Up (down 26 percent in its third week, to $14.5 million) and Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End (down 43 percent in its fourth week of release, to just over $12 million), as well as the weekend’s only other new wide release, Nancy Drew, which bowed to only $7.1 million.

In homicidal theatrical news, meanwhile, Hostel: Part II tumbled more than 63 percent in its sophomore frame, pulling in $3 million for a two-week total of just over $14 million. If writer-director Eli Roth‘s first film was a xenophobic travelogue recast as a grim exercise in “BTK-horror,” this movie highlights the amorality angle even more starkly (“We’re the normal ones,” says one of two American businessmen who eventually don swim caps and slaughterhouse gear for their vicarious thrill-kill sessions), something audiences apparently had less of an appetite for.

Kevin Costner’s wildly careening serial killer tale Mr. Brooks, on the other hand, scratched out another $2.8 million in its third weekend, bringing its total haul to $23.5 million. Made for a cost-conscious $20 million, foreign receipts and ancillary revenues might actually be enough to help realize the filmmakers’ visions of a sequel and/or franchise, an ambiguity that most certainly doesn’t await 20th Century Fox’s Fantastic Four. Stay tuned…

It’s looking like Ocean’s Thirteen is this week’s big box office champion, a win for blithe, finger-snapping spryness in general, and a vindication of the PG-13 rating’s broad appeal, especially when stacked up against the PG-rated Surf’s Up and the hard R rating of Hostel: Part II. Pending final numbers and adjustments, Ocean’s Thirteen will reportedly pull in around $37 million for the weekend. Polling second is Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End, which has to date now grossed over $250 million, with another $21 million or so this weekend. Last week’s top debut, Knocked Up, is only down 34 percent or so, ringing up another $20 million. Surf’s Up scored a robust $18 million bow, good for fourth place. The summer playing field proved less kind to Hostel: Part II, meanwhile. Playing in 2,350 theaters, the film averaged around $3,700 per screen, and should pull in around $8.8 million for the three-day frame, which is only slightly more than a then less-known Eli Roth‘s 2003 film Cabin Fever. Last year, in January,  the first Hostel opened to $19.5 million on slightly less screens. A sign of the horror genre’s loosening grip? Perhaps, but more likely an indication that seasonal slotting matters quite a bit for certain pictures.

I don’t really know what to say about this weekend’s box office tally, other than my ex-girlfriend from high school is probably happy, since she had a bizarre jones for Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, I think mostly to torment me. (Says a lot about that relationship, that…) The computer animated film TMNT (kids dig acronyms!) rung up $24.3 million in its debut frame, much of it probably from Splinter and his gape-mouthed extended family.

It’s 300 that continues to make its persuasive case for being the spring’s biggest story, commercially speaking — no shock, really, given young guys’ natural embrace of its blend of wry fatalism, skull-popping action and fantastical visual affectation. In its third week, Warner Bros.’ cash cow pulled in another $19.8 million, giving it $161.7 million in 17 days of release.

In new releases, Shooter triggered $14.5 million at just over 2,800 locations, the wretchedly titled The Last Mimzy pulled in $10 million at 3,017 venues and The Hills Have Eyes 2 (The Hills Get Glasses?) murdered to the tune of $9.7 million at 2,447 sites. Standout holdover Zodiac, meanwhile, plunged from eighth on the receipts chart to 16th, pulling in $1.16 million at 872 sites, and giving it $31.6 million in just over a month of release. Go ahead and pull the plug on that abysmally marketed mess, Paramount — hopefully a year-end re-release and second wave critical campaign resuscitates David Fincher’s gem. We’ll see, I suppose…

So Bob Saget is breathing a sigh of relief. America really does love penguins, after all, it seems. Warner Bros.’ Happy Feet danced past Daniel Craig’s debut as James Bond, Casino Royale, this weekend at the box office, pulling in an estimated $42.3 million from 5,600 screens to the latter’s $40.6 million from 5,100 screens. Good news for Farce of the Penguins, even better news for Happy Feet multi-hyphenate George Miller. For the full box office rundown from the weekend of November 17, click here.