Julianne Moore scores solid hit

Julianne Moore, better known for art-house hits like The End of the Affair, proved over the weekend that she can carry a film on her own as the supernatural thriller The Forgotten seized the top spot in North America.

It was a bloody good weekend for supernatural and sci-fi fantasies. The zany British comedy Shaun of the Dead opened strongly in a limited number of theaters while Resident Evil: Apocalypse continued attracting a large number of viewers in its third week.

Overcoming the modest expectations and snubbing the critics who called it easily forgettable, The Forgotten grossed $22 million in three days.

Moore, who also appeared in Magnolia and The Hours, starred in the 2001 hit Hannibal, but credit for that film's success went to Sir Anthony Hopkins who reprised his role from The Silence of the Lambs, playing the wily cannibal Dr Hannibal Lector.

Moore plays a distraught mother in The Forgotten who sets out to unveil a mystery regarding her son, even as she is told that she has been imagining for over eight years that she had a son.

Many critics, who found the film poorly executed, nevertheless found her work compelling.

The film, which cost about $40million, could end up earning a decent $60 million in North America. It joins the list of many female-led films such as Gotika starring Halle Berry, and Picnic Room with Jodie Foster that made quite a bit of money.

Among the other new releases, The Motorcycle Diaries, the best-reviewed film of the week, opened strongly on three screens, earning about $160,000. It is poised to add many more screens in coming weeks and could zoom into the top 10 chart in a few weeks.

The stirring and funny film, both a road movie and a coming-of-age tale, revolves around two men in their 20s who travel
thousands of miles across several South American countries on a motorcycle, hitch-hike, walk and ride crude boats. One of
them, Ernesto 'Che' Guevara, has radical stirrings during the journey that eventually make him an icon worldwide.  

Among the new widely released films, the Katie Holmes romantic comedy First Daughter, the story of a presidential daughter's off White House adventures, did not find too many spectators. Though it ranked fourth on the chart, following the fast nose-diving The Skycaptain and the World of Tomorrow, and the No 3 film of the week Mr 3000, it could muster just about $4 million.

On the other hand, the low-budget quirky zombie parody Shaun of the Dead made an encouraging $3.6 million while playing in just about 600 theatres. First Daughter was showing in more than 2,000 theaters; most new films play in 2,000 to 3,000 movie theatres in the US. Expect Shaun of the Dead, currently No 8 on the charts, to play in many more theatres next week.

The video-gamed inspired Resident Evil: Apocalypse, was in fifth place, followed by the Kim Basinger thriller Cellular.

The British import Wimbledon, starring Kirsten Dunst and Paul Bettany, clearly has weak legs. After having opened with disappointing numbers, the film lost about 52 percent of its gross from the previous week. It was in seventh place, a notch above Shaun of the Dead.

The remaining two positions on the top 10 chart were occupied by the surprise comedy hit, Without a Paddle, and Zhang Yimou's stirring Chinese martial drama Hero.

The estimated box-office gross in North America, September 24 to -26