Saturday Update

Tween girls seized control of the box office on Friday powering Hannah Montana The Movie to a huge number one opening spending an estimated $17M on the new Miley Cyrus vehicle. Disney has enjoyed a top spot debut with a Miley film for two years in a row now proving how powerful and enduring the brand is. Being the Good Friday holiday, most students had no school making the target audience more available. Films opening on the holiday generally see 40-45% of their weekend business on Friday and Hannah with its intense upfront demand should come in on the high end of that range, if not a bit above. That would give the teen queen about $37-40M this weekend challenging Scary Movie 4's $40.2M for the largest Easter weekend debut ever.

The Seth Rogen comedy Observe and Report bowed to an estimated $4.7M on Friday, its first day of release. That should put Warner Bros. on track to reach $10-13M for the three-day session. Fox released the anime-inspired actioner Dragonball Evolution to the tune of $2M, according to estimates, and should bank roughly $5M over the weekend.

Among holdovers, last weekend's champ Fast & Furious decelerated an understandably steep 65% from its opening day haul to collect an estimated $10.5M on its second Friday. A weekend gross of $27-29M seems likely for a second place finish. DreamWorks enjoyed a nice 4% Good Friday bump over last week for its toon Monsters vs. Aliens raking in an estimated $9M. Look for a $22-25M take over three days for third place.

Overall, the top ten could soar 40% or more higher than last year's Easter holiday frame which fell in mid-March.

Check back on Sunday for the complete weekend box office report.

Last Updated: April 11, 2009 at 11:30AM ET

Written by Gitesh Pandya