Following last week’s semi-wide release of Friends With Kids (which expanded to 640 screens this weekend and grossed another $1.5 million, dropping 25%), we have three more theoretically mainstream films that have been relegated to the arthouse circuit. Will Ferrell’s telanoleva satire Casa de Mi Padre debuted with $2.2 million on just 382 screens, the Jason Segel/Ed Helms comedy Jeff Who Lives At Home debuted with on a mere 254 screens grossing $840,000, and the 90s-action throwback Seeking Justice (with Nicolas Cage) debuted on 231 screens grossing $260,000. The highest grossing of the trio was Lionsgate’s Will Ferrell romp (which is entirely in Spanish with English subtitles), as it earned a solid $5,700 per-screen average. Yes, the film cost just $6 million, but you’d think that a decent marketing campaign centered around one of the more popular comic actors around could generate an opening of at least $10 million, with a final gross of around $25-30 million (Weinstein Company pulled that same trick for the $5 million Paul Rudd vehicle Our Idiot Brother last August). I’ve long complained about the ever-increasing trend of treating seemingly mainstream genre fare, even ones with big stars, and tossing them off to die in limited release so that The Lorax can have a 2D screen, a 3D screen, and an IMAX screen all to itself. Long story short, arthouse audiences aren’t the sort to flock to a bawdy Will Ferrell comedy while Ferrell fans are either unable to find it at a nearby cinema or don’t realize that it’s being released. Memo to studios – if you want your films to make money, you might want to position them to actually be seen by paying audiences.

The rest of the news is holdover related. The Lorax held strong in weekend three, grossing another $22 million (-41%) and ending day 17 with $158 million domestic. Despite stronger weekend totals, the Illumination film has slightly fallen behind the respective $161 million 17-day total of Despicable Me, although it’s still a lock for $200 million, something that no other non-Disney/Pixar or Dreamworks cartoon has done in America save Despicable Me. John Carter fell a mediocre 55%, grossing $13.5 million and ending weekend two with $53 million domestic and $179 million worldwide. It’s now falling behind Prince of Persia and will finish below $90 million domestic. With that pesky $250 million budget and The Hunger Games set to kill everything in its path next week, it’s a grim future for the John Carter of Mars. That’s all I have for that one as I’m writing a piece on the film’s financial failure later in the week (I wanted to wait at least two weekends before calling it). The two other new releases from last week, Silent House and A Thousand Words did nominal business in relation to their small opening weekends last week. The real-time/one-take horror film grossed another $2 million for a $10.5 million total. Normally a drop of 69% would be troubling, but the film is so cheap that it’s already on its way to token profitability. The Eddie Murphy comedy had a halfway-decent drop of 41% for a second weekend of $3.75 million, but the expensive Paramount leftover has still grossed just $12.1 million.

In uber-limited release news, Kid With the Bike grossed $51,000 on three screens while Detachment (the best film of 2012 thus far) grossed $11,100 on two screens. In news regarding films older than two weeks, Safe House continues to hold steady and has crossed $120 million. Project X grossed another $4 million and now sits with $48 million. It will be interesting to see how the couple would-be copycat parties over the last week (once of which killed someone) will affect the in-development sequel. Act of Valor crossed $60 million this weekend, and The Vow sits with $121 million, meaning it will surpass The Bodyguard ($121.9 million) on the list of romantic dramas in the next few days, with the $129 million gross of An Officer and a Gentleman next in its sights. This Means War crossed $50 million while Journey 2:The Mysterious Island now sits with $95 million, as its worldwide total speeds past $300 million.

That’s it for this weekend. Join us next weekend for the sure-to-be monstrous debut of The Hunger Games. Until then, keep reading and commenting.

Hmmm…A little kiss between divorced Don and Betty Draper? Could be. You never know. The second week comes “Tea Leaves.” Episode 4, in the third week, is called “Mystery Date.” No director is listed. “Signal 30″ is the title of Episode 5, which I’ve written about on Showbiz411 .

The production has been very scarce with details, but one: Pete and Trudy Campbell have had their baby since we last saw them, and it’s a girl named Tammy. (So Trudy.) A pair of twins have been hired to the play the baby. How long this season before Trudy discovers Pete already has a child, with Peggy? And: that “little kiss”– I will still bet good money that Don marries Megan and that ex wife Betty is a season long interference. Gotta have friction in the drama, kids.

Snooki is reportedly currently down in Mexico with Jenni “JWOWW” Farley as the two tape more of their new reality TV show spin-off, states People. But this trip is far different than trips in the past.

Snooki is apparently enjoying nonalcoholic drinks, but still getting plenty of rest like usual. Her pregnancy is reportedly of the utmost importance to her and something she is taking very seriously.

Pauly D will be co-hosting along with singer Dev for the show where Santigold, Mac Miller, Steve Aoki and more will perform, states UsMagazine.com. But first, Pauly D will have to work on monitoring himself.

“It’s pretty much live, so you can’t slip up and you can’t curse,” the reality TV star commented.

Pauly D will also be deejaying at the event that airs on March 18th.

“I can honestly say that I have put in every kind of effort to study this character, to work on the way he supposedly behaved. In fact, me and Sanjay (Gupta) went and met the people who knew him to find out how Manya Surve behaved and the way he spoke,” the 39-year-old said here at an event.

“There was talk of me learning Marathi for this, but the idea was to understand the colloquial nature of the language… so that you understand how Manya Surve was in everyday life. So, as an actor I have really given all my effort and worked really hard to do maximum research towards this film,” he added.

Though John plays the central character in the film, he does not feel burdened with the extra responsibility to promote it.

“I am relieved. Every film requires promotion and what I feel is what Ekta (Kapoor) and Sanjay (Gupta) have done here, is actually a boon for all of us. So I have been given an opportunity to have a platform to show what each one of us can do out here.

“I don’t feel it’s a crunch, I think it’s a great opportunity and I am going to grasp it with both my hands. So, I am very excited,” said John who was last seen in “Desi Boyz”.

Directed by Sanjay Gupta, “Shootout at Wadala” also features Anil Kapoor, Kangna Ranaut, Sanjay Dutt, Tusshar Kapoor, Sonu Sood, Mahesh Manjrekar, Ronit Roy and Manoj Bajpai.

On Thursday, her unit shot at a dhaba and some shops in Mani Majra, an old town suburb of Chandigarh, for the movie “Zero Dark Thirty” or “ZD30″.

Sources in Bigelow’s film unit say some of the film scenes will be shot in and around Chandigarh and some places in neighbouring Punjab. They had Wednesday shot some scenes in the city’s busy Sector 15 market which is frequented by youngsters owing to its location in the education zone.

To give the feel of a Pakistani town, the shops have signboards written in Urdu, the language commonly used in Pakistan, while three-wheeler auto-rickshaws and other vehicles too have got a brightly coloured layer of paint and Pakistani registration numbers.

A local hardware shop, Ramgarhia Hardware store has been renamed ‘Shahzad Hardware and Paint Store’ in Urdu. An internet cafe and a phone call centre have also been given Pakistani names for the shots.

“While the supporting actors in the backdrop are mostly hired locally or from Delhi, their clothes and appearance has been made to match with life in Pakistan,” a member who accompanied the unit from Delhi, told IANS here.

“Given the security environment in Pakistan and the strained US-Pakistan relations, too many risks were involved in shooting the film inside that country.”

Bigelow, who hit a high in 2010 by becoming the first woman director to win the Academy Award for her film “The Hurt Locker”, depicting war-ravaged Iraq, has chosen locations in north India to shoot her movie on the elimination of bin Laden.

Bin Laden was hunted down by US special operation forces in a midnight raid at a ‘safe house’ in the Pakistani garrison town of Abbottabad in May last year. It saw the special forces landing at a compound and killing the Al Qaeda chief who masterminded the 9/11 attack in the US in 2001 and other terror operations across the world.

Incidentally, the shooting for the film began here just days after the Abbottabad ‘safe house’ was demolished by the authorities in Pakistan earlier this week.

Police sources here said the Hollywood film unit, which is taking the help of production companies in Chandigarh and Delhi, is expected to shoot in the area for a week.

The film is expected to be released at the end of this year.

“I never ever hid the fact that I am a devotee of a woman’s beauty. But not only in my entire career, but never even ever since I have consciously come of a mental and a physical age to perceive and admire the beauty of a woman, have I seen a woman more beautiful than Nathalia,” he said.

“Her beauty is truly electrifying and it just sparks out from every nook and curve of both her face and her body. Her face looks so classically beautiful and her body literally looks like the perfect embodiment of an ultimate female figure.

“This combined with her ability on cue to give any expression that is asked of her is what I think will happen in only once in a decade and in this decade I think Nathalia is that girl,” he added.

Nathalia will shake a leg on item song “Dan dan” in the film, which also stars Rana Daggubati and Sanjay Dutt.

Earlier Sunny was expected to do the song.

“We were trying for Sunny Leone but by God’s grace it didn’t work out or else we would have lost out on someone as divine as Nathalia and I thank God for that,” Varma wrote on his Twitter page.

“I am starting my production, which I never wanted to do. Film production is very tough. Initially when I started, I was not successful but my wife and family members supported me… you should not give up,” Govinda, who produced the movie “Ssukh” in 2005 which didn’t do well.

“So finally I am starting my own production… and I will start for Nammu (Narmada). I have a good subject for her and I have worked very hard on it (script),” he added.

For quite some time, Narmada was trying to get into Bolllywood but things didn’t work out for her. There were reports that she will make her debut opposite boxing champ Vijendra Singh in director Lovely Singh’s “Manchali”.

Now Govinda wants to ensure that his 22-year-old daughter is launched in such a manner that she carves a niche for herself.

“I want her to create the best with whatever she has got. She should become confident in life that she should create a correct situation for herself,” the 48-year-old said.

“Shot at the Eiffel tower tonight. Now I can officially say that I know every nook and corner of this tower. Jai Ho! Ting,” Preity posted on Twitter Tuesday night.

The actress is done with the first schedule of the movie, an Indo-French co-production directed by Prem Soni. The crew shot in temperatures as low as minus 21 degrees.

“Am exhausted now… one more day to go and then holiday! Even though it’s for a week before it’s time to work on the film and then ofcourse IPL,” added Preity, who co-owns Indian Premier League (IPL) team Kings XI Punjab.