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It was a very predictable weekend for us at The Reject Report. We all knew that Dr. Seuss’ Horton Hears a Who! would finish on top of the box office with an elephant-sized performance. $45 million is the take for the weekend with heavy matinee totals, allowing Horton to smother all the other movies including 10,000 B.C., which was second at $16.4 million. 10,000 B.C. also took a 54% hit from last week’s totals.

From what I gather, this is the best opening for a Jim Carrey movie in something like five years. Bruce Almighty had an opening of almost $68 mil when it opened in 2003. Would’ve been more impressive for Carrey if he wasn’t a cartoon this time, but still, it’s good news. The folks at Fox are telling the press that this Horton movie did better than expected.

Of new releases, Never Back Down took $8.6 million. Doomsday took $4.7 million (probably hurt by that decision not to screen the flick in advance for the critics). That new, dark Naomi Watts thriller Funny Games, which only debuted in 289 theaters, took only $520,000 for 22nd-place overall.

The damages from Box Office Mojo:

1 Dr. Seuss’ Horton Hears a Who! $45,100,000
2 10,000 B.C. $16,415,000
3 Never Back Down $8,610,000
4 College Road Trip $7,893,000
5 Vantage Point $5,400,000
6 The Bank Job $4,910,000
7 Doomsday $4,743,000
8 Semi-Pro $3,000,000
9 The Other Boleyn Girl $2,900,000
10 The Spiderwick Chronicles $2,390,000

Not much more I can add, other than to say that Horton’s victory puts an end to five straight weeks of sub-par movies at the top of the box office. For five weeks the top draw in the USA was rated Rotten at Rotten Tomatoes, but Horton registered 82% “fresh.” So that’s a change for the better.

On the flip side, we are still at the pit of movie-dumping season as Never Back Down only registered a Tomatometer rating of 22%. Doomsday got 24%, and Funny Games got 46%. It’s still a sorry state of affairs at theaters with plenty of junk still getting dumped on us by these studios, whether we want to see them or not. I’m just not that enthusiastic about the movies out there right now. From what I hear, neither are you.

But don’t worry. The month of May is only six weeks away, and you know what that means. Iron Man! Indiana Jones! The blockbusters are on their way, soon. Here at the Reject Report we just cannot wait.

Back for more predictions later this week.