Oh, well, can't win 'em all. I thought Lions Gate Entertainment (NYSE: LGF) had a pretty good chance of being on top this past weekend with My Bloody Valentine 3-D. Unfortunately, it was not to be. The honors, according to early estimates at Boxofficemojo, go to Sony's (NYSE: SNE) Paul Blart: Mall Cop, a movie that does indeed look hilarious. Blart took in more than $33 million at domestic theaters.

Now, the race for slots two, three, and four are close as I write this. Time Warner's (NYSE: TWX) Gran Torino, Valentine 3-D, and News Corp.'s (NYSE: NWS) Notorious are credited with box-office hauls of $22.2 million, $21.9 million, and $21.5 million, respectively. As can be seen, the rankings could easily change when final figures are computed, but it shows just how competitive the weekend was, and how Lions Gate maybe should have tried a bit harder with its marketing campaign.

It's not that the studio necessarily needed to spend more money, it's just that maybe those in charge of selling the film could have been smarter about the ways in which they invested their ad budget. Even if being number-one wasn't in the cards for the horror flick, Valentine 3-D could have at least been a decisive second-place finisher. Still, I concede that Blart simply could have been too much competition. Really, the whole idea of parodying the profession of the mall cop would definitely appeal to the same demo as a murderous miner would. (As a side note, not long ago, I saw a mall cop on a Segway for the first time; it indeed is a humorous sight to behold.)

I expect that Valentine 3-D will see a decline of at least 50% next weekend. It's the typical pattern for a horror film, unless there's something particularly compelling about it. In this case, I don't think there's any differentiating element to the concept/plot that would predict better staying power. Plus, we can look to General Electric's (NYSE: GE) The Unborn, released by GE-owned Universal, for guidance. That project, which hit the market last weekend, grossed roughly the same amount in its debut frame as Valentine 3-D did in its opening weekend. This weekend, Unborn is down 50%, and it dropped from third place to seventh. This is why I'm such a stickler about big opening weekends, and why I'm critical when a studio doesn't do as well as it perhaps should have. You need to start from as high a level as possible so that 50% drops don't mean as much. I'm sure institutions invested in Lions Gate share my opinion on that count. We'll have to wait and see what the raging miner does next week...

Disclosure: I own GE; positions can change without notice.