After the jump: Spielberg contemplates sci-fi, Travolta visits Paris, and at last! Fag hags get a show of their own!

· Boldly empowered by his newfound independence from Paramount, Steven Spielberg's next film may finally tackle his risky, long-unexplored interest in child/alien relationships. [THR]
· Parlez vous Flopz™? John Travolta and Jonathan Rhys Meyers are off to France as a spy and embassy worker in the thriller From Paris With Love. [Variety]
· In our favorite Media Irony of the Day, masthead vagabond Tina Brown's HBO deal will officially launch with I Am Charlotte Simmons, a series adapted from Tom Wolfe's novel. [Gawker]
· Are you a "girl who likes boys who likes boys?" If so, you might be Bravo's next big star! [La Daily Musto]

The dollars aren't disclosed, but follow the jump for a depressing if fascinating array of blockbusters for sale, the brands that bought them and the ultimate recognition of their unholy unions:

Most Mouthwatering, placement most likely to prompt an immediate purchase: Louis Vuitton in Sex and the City

Perfect Fit, best chemistry between a brand and a film: Manolo Blahnik and Sex and the City

Welcome to Reality, fictional brand that you would most want in real life: Stark Industries in Iron Man

Scene Stealer, brand that stole the spotlight from its human co-stars: Ford Mustang in I Am Legend

Bomb, placement that ruined enjoyment of a scene: Nokia in Cloverfield

Odd Couple, most awkward and seemingly ineffective product placement: LG mobile phone in Iron Man

Film Whore, film that most “sold out” for product placement: Sex and the City

We were surprised to not see Transformers and its over-the-top GM endorsements singled out for anything other than the "E.T./Reese's Award for Achievement in Press Coverage," but there you have it. Other underrepresented films included Juno (Tic-Tacs, though no mention of Sunny Delight), Wall-E (Apple, plus a nod for its pseudo-chain Big 'N' Large), 21 (Planet Hollywood) and even Alvin and the Chipmunks (Fender guitars). As for 2009's early front-runners, your guess is as good as ours: We figure Tropic Thunder's doomed mock campaign for Simple Jack should at land somewhere, and let's face it — there has never been as craven a placement as a movie simply called Milk. Shame on you, Gus Van Sant!

• 2008 brandcameo Product Placement Awards [brandchannel]

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A bodyguard outside the Ed Sullivan theater reportedly had an out of body experience as Hancock star Will Smith walked by. The bodyguard said, "I should be used to being around all these famous people, but there are just moments when the logic bone in the brain turns off. Sometimes, you just stare at the guy and it's like I Am Legend: Part 2." The bodyguard began to elaborate on his fantasy where he and Smith continue to fight vampires in a post apocalyptic New York. The bodyguard added, "I rarely daydream at the job, but this was just one of those moments where it happened and it was kind of nice to zone out. I just hope that nobody noticed because that might make the next job a bit more difficult to get."

[Photo Credit: Splash Pics]

1. National Treasure: Book of Secrets - $35.6 million
Boasting another week at the top of the box office, Disney and Jerry Bruckheimer have again managed to spin Nicolas Cage relieving himself on a pile of American history books into a pop culture phenomenon. Curious as to how Dame Helen Mirren fit into the cloak-and-dagger proceedings, we had a chance to catch Secrets over the weekend, where we were thrilled to learn that [Spoiler alert! Spoiler 'round the bend! God be with all ye who travel past this point unawares that spoilers be awaitin' ye, arhh!] the silver-tressed sex goddess had been retained to reprise her Oscar-winning turn as Queen Elizabeth II, showing off her impressive aim with a stag musket and command over a pack of bloodthirsty attack-Corgies in the scene where Cage and friends break into Buckingham Palace.

2. Alvin and the Chipmunks - $30,000,000
The unassuming tale of a disheveled celebrity Eastsider's singing-rodent infestation has proven to be a force to be reckoned with: Its $30 mil weekend take brings its total to $142.4 mil, leaving it poised to crack the top ten grossing films of the year. As if you had to be told, that makes chipmunks 2008's penguins. Prepare for approximately two dozen chipmunk-related family projects to fast-track into development, including Look Who's Talking Like a Chipmunk, Flushed Away 2: Now Chipmunks Are Being Flushed Away!, and Verminy Feet.

3. I Am Legend - $27,500,000
As we refuse to see this movie, we're left with nothing but Will Smith-loving-Hitler jokes. How many Hitler-loving Will Smiths does it take to change a lightbulb? Two! One to change it, the other to reprogram the broken one.

4. Charlie Wilson's War - $11,768,000
5. Juno - $10,300,000
In the "sophisticated commercial choice for grownups" category, audiences looking for fulfillment through witty banter and mature themes who may have already caught Aliens vs. Predator: Requiem turned to saucy Sorkinisms and Diabloesque drollery for their self-satisfied weekend moviegoing experiences.

13. Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story - $3.7 million
Still languishing at the box office, the music-bio satire with the in-your-face For Your Consideration campaign even has its star Jenna Fischer blogging about its flaccid-penis attributes on MySpace: "It's very raunchy and sexy and the humor is hard core. Think 40-Year-Old Virgin but with full-frontal male nudity too. That's right ladies, we have penis."

• WEEKEND BOX OFFICE December 28-30, 2007 [Box Office Mojo]

2. I Am Legend - $34.2 million
A 56% drop-off in receipts for the last-Will-on-Earth sci-fi thriller still brings Legend's take to an impressive $137.5 mil, though it might also indicate that the premise needed a little refining. Luckily, producers have already begun making the proper adjustments for the sequel, replacing that German Shepherd (talented, but kind of one-note) with a grizzled straight-man for Smith to bounce his trademark one-liners off of, and those cheesy CGI zombies with a vast array of adorable aliens from Rick Baker's creature shop.

3. Alvin and the Chipmunks - $29 million
"It's great to be in the singing chipmunk business," Chris Aronson, Fox's senior VP of distribution, told Variety; that's a 180° change of tune from what execs were saying about the Jason Lee family film when the forecast looked less sunny, dismissively referring to it as "the untitled Richard Gere project" and "Ratatouille for retards."

4. Charlie Wilson's War - $9.6 million

5. Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street - $9.3 million

It was neck-and-tomato-soup-hemorrhaging neck for both entries in the "sophisticated commercial choice for grownups" category, as Universal marketing head Adam Fogelson classifies his Tom Hanks/Julia Roberts Oscar-craving contender. Still, when you factor in that Sweeney played to half the screens of its competitor, a clearer winner emerges, proving a Cold War-era Tom Hanks trading Sorkinesque quips from behind a glass of Scotch to be less of a draw than watching Helena Bonham Carter get burned alive.

8. Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story - $4.1 million

We had a sinking feeling when our Arclight theater was three-quarters empty last night, and sure enough, the numbers justify it: With Walk Hard, Judd Apatow gets his first taste of box office disappointment—something that surely could have been avoided had the marketing better highlighted the film's frequent close-ups on a flaccid penis.

• WEEKEND BOX OFFICE December 21-23, 2007 [Box Office Mojo]
• 'Treasure' tops at box office [Variety]

1. I Am Legend - $76.535 million
If there was any question that Will Smith is the Biggest Movie Star in the World, (a title we're fond of ironically bestowing upon the likes of Shia LeBeouf when slow weekends at the multiplex briefly brighten Hollywood's lesser lights), let I Am Legend remove all remaining doubt. In perhaps his most impressive achievement yet, Smith saved a turnaround-plagued project, gave it a a Castaway meets 28 Days Later spin by substituting an adorable German Shepherd for a volleyball given life-force by a blood-smeared smiley face, and shattered™ the December opening weekend record once held by Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King.

And just to add to the degree of difficulty of his amazing feat, Smith demanded that his zombie pursuers be cut-and-pasted from a first-generation Resident Evil game, a move that ensured that on the Monday morning after his latest triumph we would all marvel at his ability to overcome the handicap of a supporting cast of hundreds of low-rent CGI co-stars. Join us in genuflecting before our box office king.

2. Alvin and the Chipmunks - $45 million
Thank you, Fox, for giving Jason Lee the opportunity to redeem himself after the cartoon-adaptation disaster that was Underdog.

3. The Golden Compass - $9.025 million
Knowing that The Golden Compass has already died a box office death in America, New Line is redeploying its resources on the still-vital international market. At Compass's recent premiere in her Australian homeland, the studio sent Nicole Kidman to perform a daring promotional stunt to raise awareness of the film: having her attempt to twist her Botox-paralyzed face into something resembling a smile; TV cameras from every Aussie news outlet were on hand to capture Kidman's dramtic red carpet collapse after ten heroic seconds of facial exertion.

4. Enchanted - $6.004 million

5. No Country For Old Men - $3 million
We're just trying to come to grips with the fact that we live in a world where the best movie of the year was out-grossed by a Justin Long voiceover vehicle by a 15-to-1 margin.

• Weekend Box Office December 14-16, 2007 [Box Office Mojo]