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All right, I know that many of you are waiting in line for screenings of Hope Springs so I will be brief with today’s column. What? I think Hope Springs looks funny.

Yesterday, The Dark Knight Rises finished in first place in North American box office for the 19th consecutive day. Its Tuesday revenue of $4,673,412 is a 1% drop from Monday. The only noteworthy aspect of this is that every other title in the top ten increased from Monday to Tuesday. Since The Dark Knight Rises was dealing with larger numbers, you shouldn’t read too much into this.

While most films increase on Tuesday, Batman 7 has fallen from Monday on two out of three weeks now. Its lone increase was only 8% last Tuesday. Like most movies in release, there is a clear divide between the film’s Monday/Tuesdays and its Wednesdays/Thursday. It should fall about 20% tomorrow as its first two Tuesdays experienced depreciation of 16% and 22%. The Dark Knight Rises has current revenue of $363,334,004.

Also, there continues to be a strong divide between BOP readers who feel that the movie is a huge disappointment while others believe it is performing as expected. I wish you people would collectively make up your minds about whether we are cynics or apologists. I lean heavily toward disappointment but the rationale is Aurora, Colorado, not anything wrong with the movie itself. The only area where I tilt my head and think our readers are crazy is when they try to argue that the tragic shooting had no impact on box office. You folks should wear Team Loco t-shirts.

Total Recall had better news yesterday. After a frontloaded first weekend wherein the Colin Farrell movie only increased 3% on Saturday, it appeared destined to flame out quickly. This is still the likelihood, yet the movie managed a 6% increase to $3,182,578 on Tuesday. A lot of movies that qualify in the one-day wonder category experience their best weekday on Monday. With only $31,763,304 in the bank, the ultra-expensive Sony release is still in a world of hurt, but yesterday’s performance was a relative win.

A couple of family films and a dance flick rounded out the top five yesterday. Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Dog Days increased an acceptable 16% from Monday to $2,291,205 on Tuesday. With only $18,892,111 in the bank, it will need six days to manage what the first two Wimpy Kid movies managed on opening weekend.

Ice Age: Continental Drift continues to hang around the top five, not because of anything special it has done but instead as a reflection of the overall weakness of the titles in release. With $1,484,177 on Tuesday, Ice Age 4 has now earned $134,824,721 domestically. Globally, it has done just a touch better with $731 million. No, that number is not a typo.

Here is a strange bit of trivia to consider as we move forward. Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides is the only current member of the 13 movie billion dollar worldwide box office club to earn less than $300 million. In fact, the second “worst” domestic performer is Spider-Man 3 with $334.2 million. Pirates 4 earned $241.1 million. We thought that was a skewed international to domestic performance at the time and commented as such. Ice Age 4 is heading toward a final domestic take of $155 million or so. Despite this, a billion dollar global performance is not out of the question.

The fifth place movie is Step Up Revolution, which has stomped enough yards to earn $25,760,580 in 12 days. Its $1,106,691 was enough to edge out The Watch’s $1,092,937. This is the fourth day that Step Up 4 has won, while The Watch has done better on the other eight days. Had Fox realized that the best they could hope for with The Watch was a decent duel with Step Up, they probably would not have greenlighted the project. The Watch has current domestic revenue of $27,606,838, while Step Up Revolution is at $25,760,580. Of course, Step Up cost $33 million to produce while The Watch had a financial outlay of $68 million, so it is Vince Vaughn, Jonah Hill and Ben Stiller who have been served. Congratulations, Step Up Revolution lead actors Kathryn McCormick and Ryan Guzman, whoever you are!

Combined box office revenue for the top ten yesterday was $16.3 million. This is an increase of 8% or $1.2 million from Monday. We could see an uptick today if enough older consumers give Hope Springs a chance before the weekend rush.