'Skyfall' snags top N. America box office slot

AFP - The James Bond blockbuster "Skyfall" snagged the top spot at the North American box office this weekend, beating animation adventure "Rise of the Guardians," estimates showed Sunday.

"Skyfall," the 23rd episode of the spy thriller series, now starring Daniel Craig as 007, took in $11 million in its fifth weekend in theaters, said industry tracker Exhibitor Relations.

Second place, with $10.5 million, went to "Rise of the Guardians," the latest animated offering from DreamWorks, featuring Jack Frost.

After three weeks at number one, "The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn, Part 2," the fifth and final installment of the wildly popular vampire series, was bumped down to third, taking in $9.2 million

"Lincoln" -- starring Daniel Day-Lewis as 16th US president Abraham Lincoln -- came a close fourth with $9.1 million.

Parked in fifth place was "Life of Pi," a 3D fantasy by Oscar-winning director Ang Lee based on a Booker prize-winning novel about an Indian boy adrift on a lifeboat with a Bengal tiger in the Pacific. It garnered $8.3 million.

"Playing for Keeps," a romantic comedy starring Scottish heart-throb Gerard Butler, Jessica Biel, Catherine Zeta-Jones and Uma Thurman, entered in sixth place, with $6 million.

"Wreck-It Ralph" -- the animated Disney film about a video game villain aspiring to be a hero -- took seventh spot, garnering $4.9 million.

And "Red Dawn" -- a new take on a 1984 movie about a group of teenagers who look to save their town from an invasion of North Korean soldiers -- held steady in eight place. It brought in just under $4.3 million.

Denzel Washington vehicle "Flight," in which he stars as a hero pilot who is battling alcohol and drug problems, came in ninth, with $3.1 million.

Rounding out the top 10 was Brad Pitt's "Killing Them Softly," which slipped back from last week's seventh place. It took $2.7 million.

Final figures are due out Monday.