Moviegoers got down with "Up," the animated family comedy that soared into first place at the box office.
With debut ticket sales totalling $68.2 million
the Pixar film was the third best opening for the hitmaking
animation company, just behind the $70 million openings for "Finding Nemo" and "The Incredibles," according to Disney, Pixar's owner.
Like its Pixar predecessors, the action adventure - featuring a boy, balloons and a cranky old man (with the voice of Ed Asner) - earned glowing reviews from critics.
"The Disney-Pixar collaboration is probably the closet thing to box-office perfection out there," said box office analyst Paul Dergarabedian.
The summer is to be shaping up well for family-oriented movies.
Last week's box office winner, "Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian," slipped to second place with $25.5 million.
The weekend's other new wide release, the horror flick "Drag Me to Hell," opened at No. 3 with $16.6 million.
"Terminator Salvation" and "Star Trek" continued to steer a strong course, coming in at Nos. 4 and 5 with $12.8 million and $11.2 million, respectively.
Rounding out the box office winners were "Angels & Demons," which was No. 6 with $11.2 million and "Dance Flick," No. 7 with $4.9 million.
