Beverly Hills Chihuahua — America’s favorite hide-away-from-economic-calamity movie — is #1 again this weekend, projected to take in $19,900,000 by Sunday evening. Quarantine, reportedly the top grosser on Friday, is projected to come in second with $14.3 million. And Ridley Scott‘s Body of Lies — a not great but reasonably decent thriller with the usual satellite-camera pizazz and a solid, appealing Leonardo DiCaprio performance — is apparently a third-place shortfaller with a projected weekend haul of only $12.5 million.

This despite earlier projections of $15 to $17 million, and despite a reported second-place showing yesterday. If the $12.5 million figure (Steve Mason is projecting a “likely” $15 million), the best Warner Bros. can hope for at the end of the theatrical road is a gross in the mid to high 30s. (And it could could come in lower.) Factor in the $80 million or more production costs plus marketing and even if you’re a WB stockholder there doesn’t seem to be any way out of calling Lies a major wipeout. Foreign and video revenues will brighten things to some extent, but it still looks like a fairly big bust to me.
The fourth-place Eagle Eye will do $10.8, with Nick and Nora‘s $6.4 million earning a fifth-place spot. The Express — a tank — with make $4.6 million, $1600 per theatre.