Audiences thumbed their noses at critics again over the weekend, making Universal's The Musketeer, which reviewers gleefully sliced up on Friday, the No. 1 film at the box office. The movie, which reportedly cost upwards of $60 million to make, earned only $10.7 million. The No. 2 slot was occupied by Sony's Two Can Play that Game, which wasn't even shown to critics. It earned $8.3 million. Another opener, Warner's Rock Star, which nabbed good notices for its star, Mark Wahlberg, took the third slot with only $6.2 million. [The result was a major disappointment -- particularly since many analysts had forecast that it would open at No. 1. One of them, Art Rockwell of Rockwell Capital Management, told Bloomberg News: "Based on the stars in it {the film also stars Jennifer Aniston}, I thought it would do OK for a rock film. ... Goes to show Mark Wahlberg isn't a stand-alone actor."] The top 12 films grossed an estimated $62.6 million, down 17 percent from last weekend but up 39 percent from the same week a year ago.

The top ten films for the weekend, according to studio estimates compiled by Exhibitor Relations: 1. The Musketeer, $10.7 million; 2. Two Can Play That Game, $8.3 million; 3. Rock Star, $6.18 million; 4. Jeepers Creepers, $6.17 million; 5. The Others, $6.1 million; 6. Rush Hour 2, $5.9 million; 7. American Pie 2, $4.7 million; 8. Rat Race, $4.4 million; 9. The Princess Diaries, $3.4 million; 10. O, $2.7 million.

Chicago Little League coach Bob Muzikowski has vowed to continue his legal battle against Paramount Pictures following a federal judge's refusal last week to block the movie Hardball from being released. The film, which had a preview release on Saturday and will open wide on Friday, stars Keanu Reeves as a character reportedly based on Muzikowski, who coaches poor inner-city kids in Chicago. Muzikowski claims the movie defames him and misrepresents the kids on his team. Responding to a contention by Paramount that the film is fiction and is only loosely based on Daniel Coyle's 1994 nonfiction book featuring him, also titled Hardball, Muzikowski told the Chicago Sun-Times: "If it's not a true story, why are they filming on my block?" He said that if he wins his lawsuit against Paramount, he will use the money for Little Leaguers. "We're going to build a stadium for the kids ... on Paramount's dollar," Muzikowski said. "The irony is beautiful."

Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone will premiere at London's Odeon Theatre in Leicester Square on Nov. 4, Britain's Independent Television News (ITN) reported today (Monday). The screening of the Warner Bros. film, based on the J.K. Rowling bestseller, will be followed by what the TV news service called "a glamorous celebration party." Featuring an all-British cast headed by 12-year-old Daniel Radcliffe in the title role, the film includes location footage shot at Gloucester Cathedral, Durham Cathedral and Christ Church College, Oxford.

Hayden Christensen is being mobbed by reporters and photographers in Toronto, where his latest movie, Life as a House, premiered at the Toronto Film Festival on Sunday, according to a Reuters report. The film was produced after Christensen finished work on Star Wars: Episode 2, in which he appears as Anakin Skywalker (who eventually becomes Darth Vader). "It was important to me to get a film out before Star Wars and really be unrecognizable with the audience," Christensen told a news conference in Toronto. His co-star in the film, Kevin Kline, commented. "Everyone has been pretty cool here and pretty much ignoring me and swarming all over Hayden."

Surprising many analysts, an Indian film, Mira Nair's Monsoon Wedding, has won the Venice Film Festival's Golden Lion award. The low-budget film was shot with hand-held cameras in only a month. "I wanted to make something small, but I am so very happy to say that it has become big," Nair told today's (Monday) London Times. "If we win and we happen to be women, then wonderful," she added. The best actor award went to Luigi Lo Castro for the Italian film The Light Of My Eyes (Luce Diei Mei Occhi). The best actress award went to Sandra Ceccarelli for the same film.

Thursday night's MTV Video Music Awards drew an audience of some 10 million people -- the second-best result in the 18-year history of the awards show, according to Nielsen Research. The program, which was dominated by awards for 'N Sync and included a surprise appearance by Michael Jackson, also wrested a sizable audience away from the major broadcast networks, according to Nielsen, which noted that the 3 1/2-hour telecast even outdrew the networks in the 12-34-year-old demo. MTV also reported Friday that 5 million votes in the awards categories were cast on its website -- more than twice the number of last year.

CNN is likely to spend Big Bucks to boost its morning audience, analysts are predicting. Stacey Lynn Koerner, senior vice president of research at Initiative Media in New York, told today's (Monday) New York Daily News, that the cable network's decision to air the program from new studios on the street level of the Time-Life Building in New York is probably well founded. "You can build excitement about your brand on the street," she said. "It's like everything else, the content has to follow. It's just one more bell or whistle, and it's expensive." CNN programs, for the most part, originate in Atlanta. The network has also reportedly agreed to pay Paula Zahn about $2 million a year to host the program. A male co-host (Jack Ford's name is prominently mentioned in reports about the new program) is likely to receive a similar fee. The program will air opposite NBC's Today show, the current network morning leader, which is seen in about 6 million homes. Currently, CNN draws about 200,000.

Dean Valentine appears to be on his way out as president and CEO of UPN after filing a multimillion-dollar breach-of-contract lawsuit against the network on Friday. The lawsuit claims that UPN reneged on an agreement to pay him as much as $22 million based on its ratings and profitability and that he is owed the money because he "has taken a failing network with a failing strategy and turned it around." In reporting on Valentine's suit, Broadcasting & Cable magazine observed: "Many industry observers last week were betting Valentine won't be in the post much longer. The big question seems to be what kind of severance package he'll get."

AOL Time Warner has made an offer to buy AT&T Broadband, the giant telecom's cable operations, for an undisclosed amount, Liberty Media chief John Malone revealed in a conference with investors on Friday. The offer, said Electronic Media magazine, "caught all the related parties off guard." Several other companies are also reportedly wooing AT&T for its cable business, including Comcast Corp., which made a $58 billion bid for it in July. Today's (Monday) Wall Street Journal said that Cox Communications may also be considering a bid.

Gloria Tristani officially stepped down as one of the Democratic members of the FCC Friday, saying in a parting statement that one of her proudest accomplishments was pushing the commission to require that new television sets be equipped with V-chip technology to allow parents to bar their children from watching unsuitable programming. "Today, the greatest barrier to the complete success of the V-chip is the lack of public awareness about the V-chip," she said. "I urge my colleagues and the industry to use their very best efforts to bring attention to the availability of the V-chip."

Although HBO claims that there was no product-placement deal for the hundreds of World War II Jeeps that appear in its 10-part Band of Brothers miniseries, DaimlerChrysler, the current makers of Jeep, are about to launch the first commercial-sponsorship deal in the pay-TV channel's history, involving a $10-million campaign for the series that also features the Jeep logo and a salute to the WWII GIs by the car company, the New York Times observed today (Monday). Beginning tonight, Daimler-Chrysler is also airing six commercials for Jeep that include scenes from the miniseries and which were directed by Tony To, a co-exec producer. The Times observed that all involved in the marketing effort were aware of the irony that a German-based company, DaimlerChrysler, is participating in promoting a film about the event that marked the turning point in World War II. Peter Arnell, head of the agency that brought DaimlerChrysler and HBO together for the deal, told the Times: "That was then and this is now. Things change in the world."

The syndicated TV show Extra is planning to air amateur video footage tonight (Monday) of Aaliyah, performing aboard a yacht in the Bahamas for a music video just hours before her death in a plane crash on Aug. 25. "She essentially finished up this routine and went to the airport," Lisa Phillips, a spokeswoman for the TV show, told today's New York Post.