What is Cloverfield? We've been asking that question for months, and now here's one answer: It's the biggest January movie ever... that is, according to Box Office Mojo, it had the highest-grossing opening weekend ever for the first month of the year, and it's the highest-grossing film ever to open over the four-day Martin Luther King Day holiday (which, it should be remembered, is not a holiday for everyone, which keeps audiences smaller than they might have been over a more universal day off). The J.J. Abrams-produced monster movie -- which is a brilliant reinvention of the genre -- earned $46 million from Friday through Monday. That's almost double the film's announced budget of $25 million, and since fans did most of Paramount's marketing for them, for free, the studio has got to be pleased. If you missed out on the chance to be an unpaid marketing intern, never fear: Cloverfield's success is sure to bring you another opportunity to do so soon.

From a Godzilla wannabe to Bridezillas: the romantic comedy 27 Dresses did well at second place this weekend with a haul of $27.3 million. I found the film neither romantic nor comedic, but clearly I was not the intended audience. (Looks like the other new wide release this weekend, the girls-rob-a-bank-comedy Mad Money, suffered from the chick-flick competition: it came in all the way down at No. 7, with only $9.2 million.)

At Nos. 3 and 4 were two strong holdovers. The predictable but enjoyable The Bucket List dropped a mere 17 percent to earn an additional $16.1 million. And the teen-pregnancy jape Juno added $12 million to its coffers, a drop of only 12 percent ... and it may well find itself up next weekend, thanks to its just-announced Oscar nominations for its star, Ellen Page; screenwriter, Diablo Cody; and director, Jason Reitman. At No. 5, the heist-in-a-church flick First Sunday, a mess of a movie, took a more typical drop of 47 percent, earning $9.4 million for the weekend.

On the limited-release side, nothing could top Cloverfield's per-screen average of $13,496, though the standouts for the weekend were the animated coming-of-age film Persepolis, earning $10,600 on each of 30 screens, and the horror comedy Teeth, playing on four screens, with a per-screen of $9,475.

[Box office numbers via Box Office Mojo.]

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MaryAnn Johanson (email me)
reviews, reviews, reviews! at FlickFilosopher.com

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