There’s a new top dog at the box office this weekend, and that dog is a Chihuahua. From Beverly Hills, no less. The latest Disney live-action cuddly animal picture, Beverly Hills Chihuahua, made a boatload of money (in this case, a boatload is roughly $29 million, good enough for first place).

Last week’s champion, Eagle Eye, continues to fight the good fight at the box office, picking up a robust $17.7 million dollars. It’s already up to $54 million and high change, and by the time you read this it’ll be over $55 million. I still don’t get Shia The Beef’s appeal in the slightest, but he’s doing all right as he manages to outgross hot boy Michael Cera’s new film, Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist. Playlist managed $12 million and third place in its first outing, but this is the sort of movie that’ll probably have some staying power at the box office. You’d think so, anyway.

The grown-up version of Nick and Norah, Nights in Rodanthe, continues to perform strongly. Despite being down from last weekend’s second place, the newest romance from Richard Gere (the genre’s master) picked up $7.35 million for fourth place.

Speaking of genre masters, Ed Harris takes on the western with co-conspirator Viggo Mortensen, who will run out of work if he ever cuts his hair. Expanding this weekend, Appaloosa took in $5.015 million dollars and fifth place at the box office. It’s not often you see a film add 1,031 theaters in its third week, but the slow growth has been a good idea to increase buzz for a difficult to market genre film.

Difficult to market is a great way to describe the two bottom films at the box office this weekend. I’m skipping ahead a bit to make a smooth transition, but I’ll pop back and pick up the holdovers. David Zucker’s latest comedy, An American Carol, picked up $3.8 million dollars in its opening weekend. This film is notable because it’s the newly-minted right-wing Zucker’s love letter to America and direct spoofing of bloated (literally and figuratively) liberal icon Michael Moore. Because of this, it was unscreened for critics. In many ways it is appealing to the same audience that Kirk Cameron’s comeback vehicle (I still can’t believe Kirk Cameron came back) Fireproof does. Well, the same political spectrum, anyway. I somehow doubt that there’s a lot of crossover audience between relationship dramas and screwball satire. For the record, Fireproof picked up eighth place with $4.069 million dollars.

Meanwhile, notorious left-wing rabble rouser Bill Maher takes on organized religion in the tenth-place film, Religulous, which took in $3.5 million dollars in limited release. It’s a film that will undoubtedly offend anyone involved with any sort of religion, and comes across in the trailers as pretty mean-spirited (I find Maher to be that way a lot of the time, personally, though he does have funny moments aplenty). Still, it has its audience, and it’ll do well catering to them.

Among the remaining holdovers, Neil LaBute’s Lakeview Terrace continued to perform strongly, picking up $4.5 million dollars for sixth place this weekend. The Coen Brothers’ Burn After Reading continues the success streak where No Country For Old Men Left off, providing the brothers with their biggest comedy hit ever. Add another $4.083 million to the total for the weekend’s seventh‑place film, bringing its total to an impressive $51 million.

This was a very momentous weekend at the box office. Five films that were on the top ten last week find themselves on the outs this weekend. That’s a huge turnover, especially for this time of the year. Spike Lee’s newest film, Miracle at St. Anna, is shaping up to be a disaster. Speaking of disasters, Simon Pegg’s latest film, How To Lose Friends and Alienate People, had best make a fortune in Great Britain, because in America it can barely crack the top twenty (19th place, $1.4 million). Ouch.

Next week, the first of the disposable horror films scrapes into the box office as Quarantine breaks, err… quarantine. Leonardo DiCaprio continues to proclaim loudly that he is a legitimate actor, teaming up with angry Aussie Russell Crowe and Ridley Scott for the thriller Body of Lies. The fantasy adventure City of Ember also makes its debut. Guy Richie’s latest, RocknRolla, also sneaks out in limited release. Fortunately, Madonna is nowhere to be seen.