Strong holiday box office performance gave Hollywood a year-end gift among stockings full of coal caused by the lingering writers' strike, with ticket sales up nearly 18 percent in the last weekend of 2007 over a year earlier.

The top-selling 12 films are estimated to take in 169 million U. S. dollars this weekend at movie theaters in the United States and Canada, according to preliminary figures released by box office tracking firm Media By Numbers Sunday.

Hollywood has seen three "up" weekends in a row this month after five weeks of declining business in the sluggish fall season.

Number one at the North American box office this weekend is " National Treasure: Book of Secrets," a Disney release selling 35.6 million dollars this weekend. That Nicolas Cage film has taken in 124 million dollars over two weeks.

The computer-animated "Alvin and the Chipmunks" jumped on spot to number two, with an estimated 30 million dollars in ticket sales this weekend. It was in third place last weekend, and has sold an estimated 142.3 million dollars over three weeks.

Meanwhile, "I Am Legend," the Will Smith sci-fi movie slipped to third place with 27.5 million dollars this weekend and 194.6 million dollars million taken in during its three weeks of release.

Political comedy "Charlie Wilson's War," starring Tom Hanks and Julia Roberts, held steady at number 4 with 11.8 million dollars over its second weekend of release, followed by Oscar favorite " Juno" with 10.3 million dollars, as the comedy about a pregnant teenager schoolgirl expanded its release.

Hollywood will likely finish the year of 2007 with record domestic box office revenues of about 9.7 billion dollars, surpassing the previous high of 9.45 billion dollars in 2004, mainly thanks to the rising ticket prices, according to Media By Numbers.
?
(Xinhua News Agency January 2, 2007)