Alice In Wonderland retained its North American box office crown as an estimated $35m in its third weekend was too strong for new releases from Fox, Sony and Universal.

Tim Burton’s fantasy adventure stands at $265.8m and combined with $300m internationally has reached $565.8m worldwide.

Such domination is unusual in the early part of the year and Alice helped box office to a $130m weekend that was 23% ahead of the same period last year. Total domestic box office of approximately $2.43bn is tracking roughly 10% ahead of the same portion of record breaking 2009.

Fox’s high school comedy Diary Of A Wimpy Kid opened second on a very solid $21.8m, followed closely in third on $21m by Sony’s action comedy The Bounty Hunter starring Gerard Butler and Jennifer Aniston.

Universal’s box office woes continued as the sci-fi action Repo Men with Jude Law and Forest Whitaker fared poorly in fourth on $6.2m. Green Zone fell four places to sixth in its second weekend on $5.9m for a disappointing $24.7m.

Paramount’s Shutter Island ranks seventh on $115.8m after five weekends, one place ahead of Fox’s Avatar on $736.9m after 14.

In limited release Apparition released The Runaways in 244 theatres for a lacklustre $803,000, giving rise to a $3,291 per-site average. Warner Bros released the IMAX Hubble 3D production in 39 venues and the space documentary grossed an impressive $453,000 for an $11,615 per-site average.

Focus Features opened Noah Baumbach’s arthouse comedy Greenberg starring Ben Stiller and results were heartening. The film took $120,432 from three venues, generating a superb $40,144 per-site average.

Next weekend’s wide releases are: Paramount Animation’s How To Train Your Dragon featuring the voice cast of Jay Baruchel, Jonah Hill, and America Ferrera; and the John Cusack comedy Hut Tub Time Machine through the embattled MGM as the industry awaits to hear this week who will be mounting official bids to take over the ailing studio.

Estimated Top 10 North America Mar 19-21 2010

Film (Dist) / Est wkd gross / Est total to date

1 (1) Alice In Wonderland (Buena Vista) WDSMPI $34.5m $265.8m

2 (-) Diary Of A Wimpy Kid (Fox) Fox Int’l $21.8m –

3 (-) The Bounty Hunter (Sony) SPRI $21m –

4 (-) Repo Men (Universal) UPI $6.2m –

5 (3) She’s Out Of My League (Paramount) PPI $6m $19.9m

6 (2) Green Zone (Universal) UPI $5.9m $24.7m

7 (4) Shutter Island (Paramount) PPI $4.8m $115.8m

8 (7) Avatar (Fox) Fox Int’l $4m $736.9m

9 (6) Our Family Wedding (Fox Searchlight) Fox Int’l $3.8m $13.7m

10 (4) Remember Me (Summit) Summit Int’l $3.3m $13.9m

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