'Indiana Jones' rises to the top while 'Prince Caspian' continues to disappoint

The box-office results are in, and I don't think there's any surprise concerning which film took the top honors this Memorial Day. Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, distributed by Viacom (NYSE: VIA), took in $126 million over the four-day weekend at domestic theaters, according to Boxofficemojo. Taking into account Thursday showings, Skull has so far grossed about $151 million. These aren't record numbers as far as I know, but they certainly were high enough to displace Disney's (NYSE: DIS) Prince Caspian flick from the number-one position. The movie captured about $28.6 million at the multiplexes, good for second place; up to now, the Narnia sequel has a total tally of around $96 million.

Which is completely unacceptable to Disney shareholders (I'm one of the disappointed, and I wrote about my disappointment last week). Consider that the Memorial Day weekend is done, and that this is the second weekend for the project. To not crack $100 million domestically for a movie brand that was supposed to be strong considering the business that the first Narnia did back in winter 2005 should be troubling to Bob Iger.

At least Iron Man is around to cheer me up. The Marvel (NYSE: MVL) masterpiece is still in the top five at number three and has now enjoyed a $257 million take. I own shares in Marvel, so I'm glad the picture is offering some balance to Disney's relative flop. News Corp.'s (NYSE: NWS) What Happens in Vegas and Time Warner's (NYSE: TWX) Speed Racer took up fourth and fifth place, respectively. I suppose I shouldn't complain; Time Warner shareholders must put up with the fact that Speed Racer hasn't even cracked $40 million yet. Maybe that's the true bomb of the summer.