It's always exciting when a comedy that's genuinely funny does well with audiences, and that was the case this weekend with the female buddy comedy Baby Mama [1] starring Tina Fey and Amy Poehler.

The ladies won the top spot with an estimated $18.3 million, handily beating out the other comedy opening over the weekend, Harold and Kumar Escape From Guantanamo Bay [2]. EW reports that while this wasn't the best movie opening for either Fey or Poehler [3], their film did much better than many box office watchers predicted. In fact, Baby Mama gave Universal Studios its first box office winner of the year [4].

The Forbidden Kingdom was No. 3 and Forgetting Sarah Marshall [5] was right behind in the fourth spot, with both films earning approximately $11 million their second weekend out — a respectable achievement.

While Fey and company had good reason to pop the champagne, another film didn't post opening-weekend results worthy of celebration. Deception, starring Hugh Jackman, Ewan McGregor, and Michelle Williams, "fared dismally," as Variety put it. The thriller barely beat Street Kings [6] for the No. 10 spot, earning only $2.2 million over the weekend. I thought that the very talented cast did the best they could with poor material [7], but apparently that wasn't enough of a draw.

So, which movies did you check out this weekend? Did any of you see both Baby Mama and Harold and Kumar?

Source [8]