Who was the big winner at the box office this weekend? It was Sony (NYSE: SNE) and its 21 movie starring Kevin Spacey. According to early estimates at Boxofficemojo, the film took in over $23 million in its first three days of release. Looks like the market is finally getting at least a little tired of News Corp.'s (NYSE: NWS) Dr. Seuss' Horton Hears a Who! -- it fell to second place, raking in about $17 million, enough to put it beyond the coveted -- although not so impressive anymore -- $100 million mark.

Here, though, is the big surprise of the weekend from where I'm sitting -- maybe I'm not with it or something, but I thought that Superhero Movie was going to dominate. It was released by MGM and Dimension. How in the world could this have missed? It came in third with a horrible estimate of $9.5 million -- let's hope that number gets revised upward, because a gross of less than $10 million for a movie that should have been popular to the Scary Movie generation is pretty embarrassing. It seemed to have an effective marketing campaign, though; the commercials described what looked like a fun time at the multiplex, bringing home the fact that the spoof of films such as Spider-Man and X-men probably contained quite a few bellylaugh moments. Guess the timing just wasn't there for it.

According to Boxofficemojo, News Corp.'s (NYSE: NWS) Dr. Seuss' Horton Hears a Who! is still selling a lot of tickets at the domestic box office, earning about $25 million over the Easter weekend. Its cumulative total now stands at approximately $86 million. That performance was good enough for the film to retain its number-one standing for the second weekend in a row. This isn't terribly surprising, since quality family pictures have a good chance of doing well during holiday periods.

During the weekend, I composed a post about the Tyler Perry franchise and its importance to shareholders of Lions Gate Entertainment (NYSE: LGF). Well, I was wrong about its potential in regard to Drillbit Taylor, which was distributed by Viacom (NYSE: VIA). While Tyler Perry's Meet the Browns is estimated to have grossed about $20 million in theaters, Taylor is credited with about half that amount. Apparently, the comedic star-power of Owen Wilson wasn't enough to trump the popularity of Tyler Perry's cinematic storytelling; Browns came in at second place, and it should be noted that its per-theater average was much higher than Horton's.

The weekend is here, and that means a lot of people are heading to the multiplexes in search of entertainment. And it isn't just any weekend -- it's Easter weekend, so studios are hoping that they can capture some revenue magic during the three-day frame. The new movies up for competition include Viacom's (NYSE: VIA) Drillbit Taylor, a comedy featuring Owen Wilson, and News Corp.'s (NYSE: NWS) Shutter, a spooky horror flick centered around photography.

The film I'm most curious about is Tyler Perry's Meet the Browns, which is being released by Lions Gate Entertainment (NYSE: LGF). That's because Tyler Perry has become a successful brand for Lions Gate. His films seem to have a good chance of opening relatively strongly, and Perry's last flick, Tyler Perry's Why Did I Get Married, did well last fall, taking in over $55 million at the domestic box office, according to Boxofficemojo.com. The Tyler Perry franchise offers a nice contrast to Lions Gate's other big-name series -- this would be, of course, the bloody and vicious Saw series.

I think Meet the Browns will do very well this weekend, but I'm not certain it will be able to jump ahead of Drillbit Taylor. I'm hoping I get a chance to see the latter, as it looks like a nice vehicle for Wilson; plus, John Hughes and Seth Rogen had a hand in the writing of the movie, along with Kristofor Brown. Lions Gate shareholders should welcome Tyler Perry's latest release, and cheer it on during this holiday box-office period.

Disclosure: I don't currently own any of these companies in my portfolio; positions can change at any time.