Box office analysts marveled at the weekend performance of Iron Man over the weekend as the superhero movie starring Robert Downey Jr. hauled in an estimated $100.7 million. The film earned nearly that amount -- $96.7 million -- in its overseas debut as well to bring its worldwide total to $201 million, including late-night screenings on Thursday. Adding to the industry-wide celebration was word that Sony's counterprogramming strategy -- pitting the romantic comedy Made of Honor opposite the superhero thriller -- also paid off, as the movie brought in $15.5 million. Nevertheless, the combined amount did not equal what Spider-Man 3 earned on its own a year ago, when it debuted over the comparable weekend with $151.1 million domestically. No one, however, expressed disappointment. Noting that Iron Man did better than expected -- Paramount, its distributor, had predicted it would make about $60 million; most analysts had forecast about $70 million -- Paul Dergarabedian, head of the box-office tracking firm Media by Numbers, told the AP: "This is certainly the shot in the arm the marketplace has needed."

The top ten films for the weekend, according to studio estimates compiled by Media by Numbers: 1. Iron Man, $100.7 million; 2. Made of Honor, $15.5 million; 3. Baby Mama, $10.3 million; 4. Forgetting Sarah Marshall, $6.1 million; 5. Harold & Kumar Escape From Guantánamo Bay, $6 million; 6. The Forbidden Kingdom, $4.2 million; 7. Nim's Island, $2.8 million; 8. Prom Night, $2.5 million; 9. 21, $2.1 million; 10. 88 Minutes, $1.6 million.

The success of Iron Man represented a noteworthy vindication of Marvel Studios' decision to go it alone -- to finance the production of movies based on its stable of superheroes and sell distribution rights to studios, in this case Paramount. In an interview with Reuters, Marvel Studios Chairman David Maisel said, "It's the perfect way to start the new studio, to blast it off." Box office observers noted pointedly that Paramount has never produced a live-action film on its own that performed as well on an opening weekend. The film's success might also have relieved some of the concerns that studio executives may have harbored over a backlog of expensive blockbusters coming out during a nationwide recession this summer. "What I think this says about the marketplace is that if we make really entertaining movies, people will show up for them," Paramount marketing chief Rob Moore told today's (Monday) New York Times.

Troubled British rocker Amy Winehouse, who reportedly had been selected to record the theme for the latest James Bond movie, Quantum of Solace and to appear in a cameo role in the film singing the song in a nightclub, may be unable to do so. Her producer, Mark Ronson, told a British interviewer on Friday that, while he and Winehouse "did work on it, we never finished it. ... I'm not sure she's ready to work on music yet." Winehouse's problems with drugs have been front-page fodder for British tabloids of late. They quoted an unnamed Winehouse insider as saying on Friday that the singer was "furious" over Ronson's comments. "Amy wasn't happy with the finished [Bond theme] and let her feelings [be] known," the insider said. "Amy is more than capable of working at the moment despite a turbulent few weeks."

The first James Bond movie, Dr. No, is being adapted as a radio drama by the BBC, which plans to air it on May 24 to mark the 100th anniversary of the birth of Ian Fleming, Bond's creator. Dr. No was Fleming's sixth spy novel, published 50 years ago. Toby Stephens, who played the villain in 2002's 007 flick Die Another Day, will play Bond in the BBC audio drama. David Suchet, who played Hercule Poirot in the BBC-TV series based on the Agatha Christie detective stories, has been cast as the villain, Dr. No. BBC Radio said that on the same night it also plans to air an audio documentary, James Bond, the Last Englishman, in which David Cannadine, director of the Institute of Historical Research at the University of London, will argue that the Bond novels have played a key role in shaping his country's self-image.

Raising hopes that some progress is being made in talks between members of the Screen Actors Guild and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers after all, the two groups announced on Friday that they would extend their negotiations through Tuesday. They had been slated to end on Friday. According to published reports, the agreement to continue bargaining talks came after SAG agreed to drop its demand to double the residual payments for DVD sales, reducing the requested hike to 15 percent. Meanwhile the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists said that it would put off its own talks with the AMPTP until Wednesday.

Some 8,000 producers, sales agents, distributors and investors from 93 countries have registered for Cannes' Marché du Film, the deal-making side of the Cannes Film Festival, which opens next week, the Marché announced today (Monday). The figure represents an 8 percent increase in attendance over last year and a 40 percent increase since 2003. The burgeoning number of film professionals has resulted in the festival's decision to install three additional screening rooms -- bringing the total to 12 -- to host a record 1,600 planned screenings.

The audience for ABC's Desperate Housewives appeared to be returning to the show Sunday after two weeks in which its ratings sank to their lowest levels ever. While Nielsen numbers for the show continued to come in below their previous highs, Sunday's edition was easily the top-rated show of the night, with 16.63 million viewers tuning in, resulting in a 10.8 rating and a 17 share. Analysts attributed the ratings boost to a general realization among viewers that new episodes are returning after the long hiatus that followed the writers' strike. ABC also saw its shows on each side of Housewives perform solidly as well. At 8:00 p.m., Extreme Makeover: Home Edition tied with CBS's Cold Case for the lead with a 7.4/13. And at 10:00 p.m., ABC's Brothers & Sisters far outdistanced the competition with a 7.5/13.

NBC's coverage of the Kentucky Derby on Saturday earned a 9.5 rating and a 21 share, down an insignificant 3 percent from last year when many viewers likely tuned in to see Queen Elizabeth II, who was in attendance. The figure was 7 percent higher than 2006's. Meanwhile, the Associated Press said that NBC producer Sam Flood had been prepared for the tragedy that followed the race when the second-place finisher, Eight Belles, broke both ankles and had to be euthanized on the track. Flood told AP that his staff was able to find video of the horse going down taken from the blimp camera. "You don't want to show anything visually that makes you ill," Flood said, "that you inside say, 'I don't want my wife or child to see that.'"

Advertising experts disagree about whether Miley Cyrus hurt her "ability to influence brand affinity" by appearing in Vanity Fair magazine in poses that critics have described as suggestive and scandalous. David Weisswasser, head of Platinum Rye, which provides celebrity talent for top ad agencies, told Advertising Age that he though the photos were "rather tame" and were intended to help Cyrus make the transition from "pop tart" to artist. However, Jason Michelotti of Davie Brown Talent in Portland, OR, said that while her fans probably think the Vanity Fair spread is no big deal, "their parents think it's a big deal, and that's why advertisers are likely to be concerned." And Mike Sitrick, whose PR firm advised Paris Hilton after she was jailed, told AdAge that he would advise Cyrus's parents to "go on the attack. ... I mean, she exposed no more of her body than would be seen in most junior prom dresses or even bathing suits."

Mark Cuban, who became a billionaire when he sold broadcast.com, the first company to offer music, movies, and TV shows on the Internet on a massive scale, has suggested there is no future in providing individual TV shows to the public online. On his blog, Cuban quotes Sanford Bernstein analyst Craig Moffett as saying, "Five years into the video-over-the-Internet revolution, we have learned two things. First; consumers won't pay for content on the web, so it will have to be ad supported. And second; it won't be ad supported." Cuban refers to research concluding that online consumers will click away from a program if they are forced to watch more than 30 seconds of commercials at the front end of a program or more than 90 seconds within the program -- resulting in approximately 1/8th as much revenue per viewer. In addition, he observes, the networks supplying the programming receive nothing akin to the fees they receive from affiliates for the right to air the shows. Moreover, he notes, much of the popularity of online videos is "viral," so an advertiser has no idea which ones will catch on. Cuban also asks some trenchant questions about the effect of online video on conventional TV, among them: "Are TV networks making a huge mistake by putting their current TV schedules online for free? If a streamed TV show only has 2 [minutes] of commercials, will that drive some viewers to prefer watching online? Will it force networks to reduce their TV show ad load? If so, by how much?"

A television crew working for Beladi TV, owned by Iraq's ruling Dawa Party, was attacked by insurgents today (Monday). Three members of the crew were wounded, including a cameraman who was shot in the stomach and mouth and was undergoing emergency treatment at Baghdad's Al-Kindi hospital, news reports said. On Sunday, a female freelance journalist was dragged from a taxi in Mosul and shot to death. On Friday the Iraqi Journalists Freedom Observatory said that at least 37 Iraqi journalists have been killed over the past year and 235 since the U.S.-led invasion in 2003.