Below are the top 12 weekend estimates from the North American box office:

1. Monsters Vs. Aliens - $58,200,000
2. The Haunting In Connecticut - $23,010,000
3. Knowing - $14,705,000
4. I Love You, Man - $12,600,000
5. Duplicity - $7,556,000
6. Race To Witch Mountain - $5,637,000
7. 12 Rounds - $5,300,000
8. Watchmen - $2,755,000
9. Taken - $2,700,000
10. The Last House On The Left - $2,611,000
11. Sunshine Cleaning - $1,344,000
12. Slumdog Millionaire - $1,135,000

Overall, the Box Office was up 43% on last weekend's total gross.

The big winner for the weekend is the new CG-animated flick MONSTERS VS. ALIENS which took in a commanding 58.2M over the weekend. With its kid-friendly appeal and decent reviews (although not as high as usual for a film of this genre), expect this film to do good business over the next few weeks.

The number two film for the weekend, and opening with the same predictable amount of money given its genre, is the latest horror film THE HAUNTING IN CONNECTICUT which took in an estimated $23M over the weekend. Horror films open to decent numbers relative to their budget and this film is no exception, but as with most other horror films, box office is likely to plummet once word of mouth gets out on how average this film is.

KNOWING, last weekend's number one champ, did reasonably well in its second weekend against the new competition, earning an estimated $14.7M to settle in third spot. KNOWING only managed to lose 40% of its audience which is a fantastic number given that the film has not been generally well received and that MONSTERS VS. ALIENS dominated the box office this weekend.

The only other new opener is 12 ROUNDS, the new film from one-time action master Renny Harlin. The film earned a paltry $5.3M over the weekend so expect it to disappear quickly. Also, in limited release, is SUNSHINE CLEANING, which expanded its theatre venue count and saw a 100% increase in its box office, small as the final numbers were.

The US Box Office took in an estimated total of $137.5 million for the whole of the weekend 27-29 March 2009.