Given the success of recent horror reboots like Halloween and The Hills Have Eyes, it should come as no surprise that New Line’s re-launch of their Friday the 13th franchise, featuring America’s favorite immortal zombie street-hockey goalie Jason Voorhees, wound up a severed head above the competition. What’s notable however is just how much box office booty the machete-wielding one managed to pillage, i.e. $45.2 million, or per the industry expert parlance “a shitload.” Also notable is how evenly divided the horror pic was among the genders, skewing only slightly to the penis-owning side of things at 51%. Masked maniacs chopping horny teenagers to bits might not be the most romantic thing to watch, but it does prove my long-held theory that nothing gets you in a woman’s heart-shaped crotchless Victoria’s Secret thong faster than scaring the living shit out of her. Fear is like nature’s roofie. I hope you ladies remember this the next time I come crawling through your bedroom window wearing a ski mask and brandishing an ice pick; the only felony I’m committing is the crime of loving too much.

New Line also took the number two spot for the weekend with their rom-com He’s Just Not That Into You – which, as predicted in this column last week, saw only a 15% drop from its debut the week previous – taking in an impressive $23.4 Million. Film’s success owed in no small part to the fact that the title gave its largely female audience an immediate answer as to why they were alone and dateless on Valentine’s Day. Ben & Jerry’s missed out on the perfect cross-marketing opportunity for their new product line “…Because You’re a Fat-Ass,” containing chunks of chocolate, Heath bar, xanax, desperation and failure.

Way to go, New Line. Guess laying off 90% of your staff was a recipe for success.

Also continuing to impress was Luc Besson’s sleeper hit Taken, starring Liam Neeson. Non-sexy kidnapping flick was actually UP 8% over the previous week and in just three weeks has taken in $150 million worldwide. The aforementioned triumvirate fueled one of the box office’s best Valentine’s weekends evar, proving that YES the studios made the right decision by laying off all those people last month, because their business is definitely on the skids… in Bizarro Superman’s world. In our slice of the multiverse however, it supports the historical data that when the economy’s in decline, the box office will shine. I’m sure that news is like a ray of sunshine on a rainy day for you former studio employees reading this on your iPhones/Blackberries as you wait in line for your unemployment checks.

The weekend’s complete top ten resides below.

1. Friday the 13th (NL) — $45,210,000
2. He’s Just Not That Into You WB (NL) — $23,365,000
3. Taken (Fox) — $22,200,000
4. Coraline (Focus) — $19,109,000
5. Confessions of a Shopaholic (BV) — $17,303,000
6. Paul Blart: Mall Cop (Sony) — $13,850,000
7. The Pink Panther 2 (Sony) — $10,800,000
8. The International (Sony) — $10,700,000
9. Slumdog Millionaire (Fox) — $8,725,000
10. Push (Summit) — $7,931,000

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